Message from the Chair

In this first issue of the McMaster University Chemistry Department newsletter we hope to bring you up-to-date on recent events. Moreover, we invite you - our alumni and alumnae - to tell us about your own activities that may be of interest to other chemistry graduates.

First of all, we encourage you to look us up on the web and see how many faculty members you still recognize. Of course, there may be new faces since your time here, and some of your favourite professors may no longer be with us.

After the wave of early retirements brought on by the Ontario Government's austerity measures, the tide is slowly turning and we expect to welcome three new faculty members over the next few months. Our most recent recruit is Dr. John Brennan whose interests in Biosensors bridge a number of areas in analytical, physical and biochemistry.

It is evident that multi-disciplinarity is an important facet of modern chemistry; we must resist the temptation to cloak ourselves in restrictive labels. Such ideas are repeatedly emphasized in very successful "Careers Nights" organized by the Undergraduate Chemistry Club. On these occasions, we are continually impressed by the range of occupations practiced by our B.Sc., M.Sc. or Ph.D. graduates who have come back to discuss their experiences in industry, academia, and public service. We are enormously proud of their achievements.

To quote a few newsworthy events, I begin by telling you that we shall be abandoning the old laboratories in the Burke Science building to occupy modern, well-equipped facilities in the "Geology Wing" of the Arthur Bourns Building (known to the old-timers as the Senior Sciences Building). The merger of the Departments of Geography and Geology into a "Geo-School" provided the opportunity for space reallocation, and plans are well underway for a complete revitalization of our undergraduate laboratory experience.

Another popular innovation has been the introduction of a Co-op program in Chemistry whereby many of our best students spend two eight-month periods in industry as part of their degree requirements. We are also founder members of the Canada-European Union exchange program which facilitates study opportunities at 22 European partner institutions in countries as diverse as Germany and Greece, France and Finland, or Switzerland and Spain. Such exchange programs have become extremely popular in Europe and there is great demand for their students to spend an academic year in Canada. Naturally, we welcome such exchanges, which enhance the international nature of science, and we encourage our own students to take advantage of the reciprocal opportunities in Europe.

Concomitantly, our own chemistry graduate program is a veritable United Nations! We currently have 71 graduate students from many countries.

As you peruse this newsletter, we trust that you will be reminded of your own time here. Let's keep in touch.

Michael J. McGlinchey
Professor and Chair