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GOVERNMENT AND SOCIETY ically Associated Neurological Disorders, a nonprofit that has tried to keep silicone breast implants off the market. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has measured platinum levels in the general population as part of its National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). In subsamples of participants aged 6 years and older from NHANES 1999– 2000 and 2001–2002, platinum levels were below the detection limit of 0.04 µg/L in all but a few percent of the samples. The levels reported by Lykissa and Maharaj in their control samples were 100 higher. Both groups used inductively coupled plasma MS for the platinum analyses. Maharaj offers a possible explanation for the large discrepancy. “Our wholeblood control samples may represent the population’s increasing exposure to platinum,” she says. “However, again, n
values are small, so I think that it is inappropriate to draw conclusions based on this small subset,” she emphasizes. In his review article, Brook concluded that platinum is found in its zero-oxidation state at parts-per-million levels in silicone breast implants. He stated, “The experimental evidence supports the conclusion that there are no clinical consequences of the platinum in silicone breast implants.” That is the same conclusion that the U.S. National Academies’ Institute of Medicine came to in its 1999 report Safety of Silicone Breast Implants.
To publish or not? Rarely does AC receive a paper that has such societal importance and generates so much controversy. “Sometimes, if there is a controversy and you can’t see the problem with the science, then to let it come out in the literature is part
of scientific publication. Editors shouldn’t shy away from controversy, if the science does not obviously have holes in it,” says Royce Murray, Editor of AC. But sometimes editors make mistakes, and scientific holes get into the literature. Catherine Fenselau, the associate editor who handled the manuscript, says, “The manuscript went through a full review and, as the associate editor who handled it, I am ultimately responsible for the review process. In hindsight, there now seem to be strong arguments that the science in the paper was probably flawed.” Nonetheless, the topic is one that deserves attention. “As this is a very important issue in women’s health, much more funding is needed to support a study by independent researchers that includes many more exposed women and an equal number of control subjects,” says Maharaj. a —Britt E. Erickson
PEOPLE
From left to right: Edwin D. Becker, Christopher T. Culbertson, Andrew G. Ewing, Alanah Fitch, Neil L. Kelleher, Joseph Wang, Mary J. Wirth
2006 DAC award recipients Seven analytical chemists will receive awards from the American Chemical Society (ACS) Division of Analytical Chemistry (DAC). All of the awards will be presented at the ACS fall meeting in San Francisco, except the Award for Young Investigators in Separation Science, which will be presented at the 2007 Pittsburgh Conference. Nominations for the 2007 awards are due to Chris Enke (
[email protected]) by November 1. Please see www.acsanalytical.duq.edu for details. 5242
Edwin D. Becker, scientist emeritus at the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH), will receive the Award for Distinguished Service in the Advancement of Analytical Chemistry, sponsored by the Waters Corp. Becker is best known for his research; teaching; and writing on NMR spectroscopy, which includes several textbooks, an ACS audio course, and historical articles. He has served as an associate director of NIH, as secretary general of IUPAC, and in various ACS positions. Christopher T. Culbertson, assis-
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tant professor of chemistry at Kansas State University, will receive the Award for Young Investigators in Separation Science, sponsored by Agilent Technologies. Culbertson’s current research interests include the development of microfluidic devices for cell culturing and single-cell analysis, the use of sol–gel chemistry to create novel structures in microfluidic devices for sample handling and separations, and the application of nanoscale separation techniques to the identification of insect hormones and proteins.
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Neil L. Kelleher, associate professor of chemistry at the University of Illinois, will receive the Arthur F. Findeis Award for Achievements by a Young Analytical Scientist, sponsored by Philip Morris USA. Kelleher’s research is in MS-based enzymology and top-down proteomics of intact proteins, such as chromatin, for efficient detection of their posttranslational modifications. Joseph Wang, professor of chemical engineering and chemistry at Arizona State University (ASU) and director of the Center for Bioelectronics and Biosensors at the ASU Biodesign Institute, will receive the Award in Electrochemistry, sponsored by the Cole-Parmer Instrument Co. Wang’s research interests include nanobiotechnology; bioelectronics; nanomaterials-based sensors; microfluidic biochip devices; enzyme electrodes; DNA and protein recognition and diagnostics; and electrochemical sensing devices for environmental, security, and clinical monitoring. Mary J. Wirth, professor of chemistry and fellow of the BIO5 Institute for Collaborative Bioresearch at the Uni-
versity of Arizona, will receive the Award in Spectrochemical Analysis, sponsored by DAC. Wirth’s current research interests are in single-molecule studies of biosensing and drug binding and new materials for bioanalytical separations.
Whitesides awarded Priestley Medal George Whitesides, the Woodford L. and Ann A. Flowers University Professor at Harvard University, is the recipient of the American Chemical Society’s Priestley Medal for 2007. The award is the highest honor bestowed by the society to an individual in recognition of his or her distinguished services to chemistry. Whitesides’s research interests include physical and organic chemistry, surface science, microfluidics, self-assembly, micro- and nanotechnology, the origins of life, and science for developing economies. ROBERT A. LISAK
Andrew G. Ewing, professor of chemistry, professor of neural and behavioral science, and J. Lloyd Huck Chair at Pennsylvania State University, will receive the Award in Chemical Instrumentation, sponsored by the Dow Chemical Foundation. Ewing’s research interests include electrochemical, separations, and MS-imaging methods for conducting analyses in volume-limited samples, such as single nerve cells and the brains of fruit flies. Alanah Fitch, professor of chemistry at Loyola University, will receive the J. Calvin Giddings Award for Excellence in Education, sponsored by the Dekker Foundation. One focus of her work is the development of community-centered, project-based curricula for the analytical chemistry laboratory. As a recent National Science Foundation Discovery Corps Fellow, she engaged three universities in East Africa in real-time control of instrumentation via the web. She is a member of the newly constituted Committee on Ethics of ACS and is an associate editor for the Analytical Sciences Digital Library.
From left to right: Paul Boswell, Nicholas Cellar, Qiang Fu, Suminda Hapuarachchi, Richard Paproski, Dwight Stoll, Lin Wang, Oh Kyu Yoon
2006–2007 DAC Graduate Fellowships The American Chemical Society Division of Analytical Chemistry (DAC) Graduate Fellowship Committee has selected 8 analytical chemistry graduate students to receive either 9-month fellowships during the 2006–2007 year or 3-month fellowships during the summer of 2006. The mission of the Graduate Fellowship Program, which is sponsored by the benefactors named in the follow-
ing student profiles, is to encourage basic research in analytical chemistry and to recognize future leaders in the field.
Nine-month fellowships Nicholas Cellar of the University of Michigan (Robert Kennedy, thesis adviser) is developing separations-based sensors for in vivo chemical monitoring. He uses multilayer soft lithography of
PDMS to create microfluidic chips with pneumatically actuated pumps and valves to drive sampling, derivatization, and injection; at the same time, electrophoretic separation and laser-induced fluorescence detection allow multianalyte monitoring. The Procter & Gamble Co. sponsored his fellowship. Dwight Stoll of the University of Minnesota (Peter Carr) is working on
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PEOPLE improving the speed of 2D HPLC to make this highly informative technique more accessible to researchers in biological fields. His work involves the use of high-temperature (>100 °C) HPLC conditions, especially in the 2nd-dimension separation, to dramatically reduce the 2D HPLC analysis time to 30–60 min. Eli Lilly and Co. sponsored his fellowship. Lin Wang of the University of Florida (Weihong Tan) focuses her research on bionanosciences, bionanotechnology, and the molecular engineering of DNA probes. She aims to design and synthesize novel nanocomposite materials and to investigate their applicability in significant biomedical problems. Currently, she is developing nanoparticles and molecular probes for multiplexed signaling and ultrasensitive analysis of DNA, mRNA, proteins, and microorganisms. GlaxoSmithKline sponsored her fellowship. Oh Kyu Yoon of Stanford University (Richard Zare) is developing a multiplexing MS technique called Hadamard transform TOFMS. This technique can mass-analyze samples at high acquisition rates and sensitivity. The Society for Analytical Chemists of Pittsburgh sponsored his fellowship.
Summer 2006 fellowships Paul Boswell of the University of Minnesota (Philippe Buhlmann) is developing a novel class of ionophore-based sensors made with fluorous matrixes instead of conventional lipophilic matrixes. He uses these sensing membranes to study the degree to which the extreme nonpolarity and nonpolarizability of fluorous phases enhance their selectivity and robustness. Eastman Chemical Co. sponsored his fellowship. Qiang Fu of the University of Wisconsin at Madison (Lingjun Li) is developing MS-based methods for the global analysis of neuropeptides in the crustacean nervous system. His research also involves the use of chemical labeling and tandem MS to elucidate the gasphase fragmentation mechanisms of 5244
protonated peptides and carbohydrates. DuPont sponsored his fellowship. Suminda Hapuarachchi of the University of Arizona (Craig Aspinwall) is working to improve the speed and sensitivity of CE by introducing new chemical-labeling techniques and developing a novel sample-injection interface based on photophysical activation of fluorogenic labels. Fast separations of biologically important molecules such as neurotransmitters, byproducts of neurotransmitter synthesis, proteins, and hormones are the primary targets. Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Research & Development sponsored his fellowship. Richard Paproski of the University of Alberta, Canada (Charles Lucy) uses supercritical fluid chromatography and high-temperature LC to study titania and zirconia stationary phases, respectively, for improving hydrocarbon group-type separations of diesel fuels and heavy gas oils. He also studies monolithic stationary phases and smallparticle-packed columns to significantly reduce separation times. The Society for Analytical Chemists of Pittsburgh sponsored his fellowship.
Honorable mention The DAC Graduate Fellowship Committee awarded honorable-mention status to fellowship applicants Jamie Iannacone of the University of Illinois (Jonathan Sweedler), Philip Remes of the University of North Carolina (Gary Glish), and Hamed Shadpour of Louisiana State University (Steven Soper).
applicant’s thesis adviser must be a member of DAC, and only one nomination per adviser will be accepted. In addition to the application forms, applicants must submit three letters of recommendation and copies of their undergraduate and graduate transcripts. Detailed information about the fellowship program and the application process can be found on the program’s homepage (www.wabash.edu/acsgradu atefellowship/home.htm). Application forms can be downloaded from this website or can be obtained by contacting Richard F. Dallinger at Wabash College (
[email protected], 765-3616242, fax 765-361-6149). Completed application packages for the 2007–2008 fellowships must be submitted to him by December 8, 2006.
ACS Short Courses of interest Selected programs at the ACS national meeting in San Francisco: Advanced HPLC in Pharmaceutical Analysis, Sept 11–12 FTIR Spectroscopy: A Hands-on Workshop, Sept 11–12 Fundamentals of HPLC, Sept 11–12 How to Develop, Validate, and Troubleshoot Capillary GC and HPLC Methods, Sept 13–14 Interpretation of Mass Spectra, Sept 7–9 IR Spectral Interpretation: A Systematic Approach, Sept 13–14
Applications for 2007–2008 DAC Graduate Fellowships
LC/MS: Fundamentals and Applications, Sept 11–13
Applications are now being accepted for the 2007–2008 American Chemical Society Division of Analytical Chemistry (DAC) Graduate Fellowships. These fellowships are available to full-time graduate students working toward a Ph.D. in analytical chemistry. Applicants must be nominated by their graduate thesis advisers and must have completed at least their second year of graduate studies by the time their fellowships begin. The
Peptide and Protein Characterization with MS, Sept 7–8
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Practical CE, Sept 13–14 Statistical Analysis of Laboratory Data, Sept 11–13 Please visit the ACS Short Courses homepage (www.chemistry.org/ shortcourses) for details.
