a
CONSULTING CHEMISTRY AS AN EXAMPLE OF INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH' CORNELIA T. SNELL Foster D. Snell, Inc., New York, New York
1HAPPEN to he connected with a consulting organization, so I thought you might like to hear about some of the kmds of research problems encountered there. This sort of organization has a broad range of activities, as shown by the following illustrations. Since I am going t o talk about our own group of consulting chemists and chemical engineers I am afraid I shall have to make this more or less personal. Almost 30 years ago my husband-now president of the organization which bears his name--started his career as a consultant while still a graduate student a t Columbia University. The business has grown from a oneman, part-time job t o one employing over 100 people, who work in some one of a number of different departments, according to their special interests and training. Just as chemistry concerns almost kverything from allergy t o zirconium, the chemical problems brought to a group of consultants may involve resins or textiles, drugs or cosmetics, construction of chemical plants or destruction of waste materials. You might like to ask, "What is a consulting chemist?" One definition-probably as good as any-is that he is a member of the chemical profession who, for a fee, attempts to solve chemical problems. Perhaps you wonder who employs chemical consultants. There are many kinds of clients. Some are large manufacturing firms who maintain their own laboratories but want specialized advice, specialized research, expert testimony in a patent case, or the use of spcialized equipment. Some clients have no laboratories of their own and for them our staff members serve as their chemists. These may be.large firms making products of such a nature that their requirements for chemical service are intermittent. Some clients are small 6rms in chemical manufacture which use our facilities because it is more economical than t o maintain a laboratory of their own. For some clients we may take 'Presented at the 13th Summer Conference of the NEACT, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, R. I., August 22, 1051.
a problem requiring only a week or two of work; for others we carry on research programs which continue over a period of years. Most of our work is in the field of research and development. It is never a question of conducting an investigation a t our own expense with the hope of selling the results. A successful consulting laboratory cannot be operated that way. The consultant first gets the client, and incidentally likes to have some assurance that the client will be able t o pay his hill. On his part, the consultant must he able to produce results, since only by accomplishment can he establish a desirable professional reputation. The type of work we do, I think, is best explained in terms of specificexamples. I am sure my husband looks hack with amusement a t some of the simple problems which first came to him. One of his earliest jobs we might c a l l 4 la Sherlock Holmes-the Case of the Imported Lace. On arrival in New York a shipment of lace was found to have been discolored by water stains. Naturally the question arose as to liability for damage. If the lace had become wet while in the hold of the ship. then the shipping company would be liable for the damage; but if it could be shown that the lace must have been stained before it was loaded onto the ship the shipping firm would bear no responsibility. In order to settle this some of the lace was sent to the laboratory, where it was soaked in water; the aqueous extract was then tested to show the presence or absence of sea-water salts on the lace. Since none were found, this result was reported as reasonable evidence that the damage had not been caused by sea water and that the shipping company was not a t fault. An adjustment was made based on this report. Not all consulting work finds such an easy solution. Sometimes a manufacturer finds himself confronted with a change in his plant or procedure, made necessary by a new law. For example, a t one time it was the custom of industrial plants to discharge their waste waters into neighboring streams. In many instances
100
FEBRUARY,1952
a
this caused change from the naturally clear, sparkling water into a dark-colored, vile-smelling liquid whose odor might carry a mile or so on the wind. Such contaminated waters usually kill vegetation along the banks as well as all fish lie. To avoid such a condition many states have passed laws requiring all plants in the state to purify their industrial waste? to meet a definite standard before these are run into streams and rivers. When New Jersey passed &ch a law many of the dye works located along the Passaic River found that they had a real problem on their hands. Dr. Snell was called in and collaborated with civil engineers in investigating suitable treatments to decolorise and clarify the effluents from these plants. Following the laboratory investigations, several treatment plants were constructed. The precipitated sludge was sent to waste piles while the clarified liquid went into a stream, but no longer with hannful effects. As another example, our group has been active in the study of synthetic detergents or soapless soaps, such products as you see on the market under the trade names of Tide, Dreft, Breeze, Vel, Glim, Surf, Joy, etc. These contain no soap but do a good cleaning job, and are especially useful in hard water, where soap forms a gummy curd. In develpping the basic material for this general type of product, it is necessary to evaluate removal of soil in the laboratory in order to determine whether one agent is more efficient than another under particular conditions. We have worked out methods of evaluation and have published these, as well as other articles dealing with cleaning problems, in various scientific journals. In our engineering department, methods and lay-outs are planned on a small pilot-plant scale for later application to full-scale installation. One client asked us to design a plant in which peanut oil could be made from peanuts or tung oil from tung nuts, depending upon which kind of nut happened to be in plentiful supply a t various times of the year. Furt.hermore,he wanted to build the plant on the Island of Madagascar, an extremely isolated region, as you know, and this meant that additional facilities for generating electric power, process steam, and heating steam had also to be designed. And, finally, machinery for making cans from tin plate had to be installed. I t was a, pretty complete job of consulting, but the client got his plant and today not only makes high-grade edible peanut oil, and good-quality tung oil for paints, but the press cakes from the two processes-that is, the solid material that remains after the oil is pressed outis being used for animal feed from peanuts, and fertilizer from tung nuts. I mentioned the necessity of meeting the require ments of new state laws. Federal laws affect some manufacturers. For example, manufacturers of cosmetics and other items to be nsed on the skin must comply with the Pure Food and Dmg Act. One of the requirements is that they have no irritant or toxic effect on normal skin. An experimental product. is first
tested on the skin of animals; for example, a new suntan lotion may be applied first to the shaved skin of rabbits to show possible irritant or harmful effects. If the product passes this test it is then tried on human subjects by means of patch tests on the arms. With a sufficient number of people used, if no more than a few per cent of the subjects show skin irritation the product is considered safe. Physicians and dermatologists often collaborate with us in these skin-test problems. The evidence obtained may be submitted by the client, if required, to the Food and Dmg Administration in order to obtain approval of a new product. Tea tasters have long been recognized as experts in their particular field, but only recently have scientists turned their attention to such matters. It can now frequently be determined not only why one particular product tastes better than another but what the degree of difference is between them. Not everyone can be taught this sort of evaluation but most people can. In our laboratory we have a special tasting panel of 5 to 15 people who have a well-educated sense of taste and can detect very delicate differences in flavor as well as degrees of difference. Many problems can be solved by this method. For example, a bakery mas getting its output back from time to time because the bread, cakes, coffee rings, etc., had a bad taste. There seemed to be no difference in baking procedure or ingredients to account for it. It was discovered that the off-flavordeveloped only on days when the wind blew from a certain direction-that of a nearby chemical plant. The trained tasting panel found the same unpleasant odor and flavor in the baked goods as that of the chemical made in the neighborhood plant. This illustrates the close cooperation between difTerent departments in a consulting group. Members of the analytical department did the sampling of the atmosphere and the chemical determination, membcrd of the ~ r g m o l ~ p tpanel ic made the tnstr e\vluution to idmtifv the ohirctionable material in the baked foods. Perhaps a typical activity of a consultant-quite diierent from those just described-is court practice, in both the federal and the lower courts. Judges as a rule prefer that the "expert," the person supplying strictly technical information bearing on the case, be someone not directly connected with either the plaintiff or the defense. hat is why this type of work is a natural for the consultaut, and no doubt also for members of the teaching profession. One such case had to do with a blue coating on razor blades. The questions were really two: whether this blue coating actually protected them from rusting and whether two different brands of blue-coated blades were made according to the same patent. Since the blue film was a form of iron oxide only about 720 millimicrons thick, the experimental investigation proved to be quite a problem. The plaintiff in this case was trying to prove that the blue coating did not prevent rusting. In this he was successful but he lost his case on the patent.
102
JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION
Sometimesa legal case requires months of research in and shook it, it rattled. On pouring oucthe contents, the laboratory in order to develop the technical back- he found an iron nut which had dropped off the tilling ground to establish the pertinent facts, even though the machine. There was his positive test for iron without trial itself may take only a few days, or weeks a t the the use of reagents. In conclusion, I like the story about the salesman, most. Plain common sense has its place in consulting work, w h w v e r y discouraged a t having to report his inas everywhere else. A bottle of liquor in which the ability to make a certain s a l e s a i d , "Oh, well, you can whisky had turned black was brought in for examina- lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink." man, your job tion. We were to 6nd the cause. The analyst started The sales manager replie'd, "H-, t o pour out a sample in order to make a qualitative test isn't to lead him to water, your job is to make him for iron. He thought that the liquid probably con- thirsty." That is my interpretation of what develop tained iron tannate, the coloring matter ordinarily ment work does; it makes you "thirsty" for more present in black ink. When he picked up the bottle knowledge.
