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MORSE: |
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I'm
Michael Morse; I'm a professor at the
chemistry department at the University
of Utah. |
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ASPIRE: |
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What
kind of science do you do? |
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MORSE: |
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Well,
I'm a physical Chemist. That means I
study molecules from a physical point
of view. In fact I'm sort of half way
between chemistry and physics. I would
be hard pressed between whether I'm
a physical chemist or a chemical physicist.
In fact there's a new journal published
in Europe that's called physical chemistry
chemical physics where it emphasizes
the two where it's really on the boarder
between the two disciplines. More specifically
what I do is a…. I…. All
molecules have quintile physical energy
levels that are governed by the theory
of quantum mechanics and the separation
between those levels can be measured
very accurately by using light to excite
the molecule from one level to another
and measuring the wavelength of light
that does that. When you measure those
wavelengths you learn about the quantum
energy levels of molecules and that
gives a lot of information about the
nature of the molecules. So I use a
spectroscopic to do things like... measure
the bond energy, that is how much energy
it takes to rip the molecule apart.
And I tend to be particularly interested
in small molecules where it's easier
to model the energy levels and in molecules
that contain transition metals because
the chemical bonding that the transition
metals MHN is very complex and not completely
understood even now. So I'm learning
new things about that. |
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ASPIRE: |
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Is
it research theory or experimental? |
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MORSE: |
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It's
certainly research and it's certainly
experimental. Occasionally we do employed
theory as well to help us understand
in what's going on because you certainly
need to be able to calculate the quantum
energy levels in order to make sense
out of the measures quantum energy levels
and so that means you got to use some
theory. |
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ASPIRE: |
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And
what makes your science important? |
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MORSE: |
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Well,
as I said the transition metals are
not very well understood in detail but
yet out there once of the most important
classes of elements. In fact, without
transition metals none of us would be
alive today. We need them in many of
the important functions in our body
from binding oxygen to carry through
our blood cells to our cells, to some
of the vitamins like vitamin B12 and
cobalt and there are a lot of absolutely
essential chemical reactions that we
need transition metals for. The other
area where it's very important is in
catalysis in cleaning up the environment
like removing the carbon monoxide and
nitrogen oxide from the exhaust stream
of a car and applied transition metal
catalyst that are not completely understood
and how they work and so what I'm doing
is completely fundamental science. I'm
not trying to build a better catalyst
or create an artificial blood that can
float through your veins but I'm definitely
working on trying to understand exactly
how these metal atoms bind to lignin's
and other metal atoms so we can understand
about these processes in more detail. |
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ASPIRE: |
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What
made you decide to go into the field
you study? |
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MORSE: |
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Well,
I always knew I wanted to be a scientist.
I just drawn to that for some reason
and I always liked math and for years
I had the mistaken idea that my father
was a chemist. He working for a chemical
company. I figured "Oh if he worked
for a chemical company he must be a
chemist" And it turned out that
he was a mechanical engineer for a chemical
company so lucky for me if I'd realized
he was a mechanical engineer I would
have maybe ended up as an engineer.
But I liked what I do and I've always
had a desire to understand it as much
as about the physical world as I could
and chemistry is certainly a good field
for that because your right in the middle
of things. Chemistry at one time at
least someone could be quoted at saying
it's the central science it explains
it relates to biology, it relates to
physics or it related to essentially
everything else so that's a good choice. |
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ASPIRE: |
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How
did you come to the U of U? |
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MORSE: |
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Well,
I was born in Pennsylvania, grew up
there and went to colleague in Pennsylvania
then went to the University of Chicago
for graduate school and did a postdoctoral
research at Bryce University. By that
time I knew I wanted to become a chemistry
professor at a research university so
I applied to, probably, twenty five
places that had adds and was invited
to interview to about six of them or
seven of them or something like that
and got offers from two and the university
of Utah was definitely the best place
to be, I fell in love with Utah when
I came here. |
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ASPIRE: |
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With
the mountains and everything. |
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MORSE: |
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Yeah.
In Salt Lake it's a really great place
to be. |
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ASPIRE: |
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What
do you like most about your job? |
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MORSE: |
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I
really like seeing a light click on
in someone's head when they understand
something then you see them go off and
do something. That's one thing I like
very much in my job. Another thing is
when some piece of research suddenly
clicks and all pieces fits together.
The type of stuff that I do, recording
of spectra and interpreting it, it's
fairly detailed and it's like a jigsaw
puzzle. If you don't get it right the
pieces don't fit. You have to sometimes
just start all over again to understand
what it means like what the spectra
means. But when it fits, all the pieces
fit together exactly right. It clicks
into place and suddenly "Boom!"
you understand. |
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ASPIRE: |
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like
a mathematical problem. If you do a
mistake in the beginning it's going
to have a chain reaction in the rest
of the formula. |
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MORSE: |
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Yeah,
it's sort of like that, yeah it's more
pattern recognition. It really is like
a jigsaw puzzle. If you try to put all
the pieces together it just doesn't
work. It may look like it's going to
work for a while but by the time you
get to the end of the puzzle it's just
not right and so then you have to take
the whole thing apart and start all
over again. |
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ASPIRE: |
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Back
to the drawing board. |
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MORSE: |
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Yeah. |
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ASPIRE: |
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What
do you like least about your job? |
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MORSE: |
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I
don't like some of the administrative
stuff. I don't like having to write
grant proposals and I really don't like
it when equipment breaks and when projects
and experiments just don't work because
of a reason that we cant understand. |
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ASPIRE: |
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What
hobbies do you have outside of science? |
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MORSE: |
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Well,
I like hiking and spending time with
my kids. I do a lot of stuff with my
kids. That's probably the greatest amount
of time while doing anything. I like
bird watching. I was a big bird watcher
for a while. Reading of course. |
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ASPIRE: |
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What
advice would you give to an aspiring
scientist? |
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MORSE: |
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First
of all, try to identify the field that
turns you on. Science is a lot of work
and you have to be passionate about
it. You have to really feel like you
want to understand this desperately
and then just spend as much of your
time as you can. Learning about that
field it doesn't have to be stuff that's
covered in your classes. It can be reading
books on the side, that kind of stuff.
Definitely try to associate yourself
with a professor here at the U, if you
can, to work in his laboratory If he's
doing experimental work. Those kinds
of opportunities are all, certainly
throughout the chemistry department
and you get more out of that than you
think. Even if the projects don't work
just being in the environment where
people are thinking about how to do
experiments or how to think about theories,
seeing how they think is a tremendous
learning experience. It can help you
a lot. |
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ASPIRE: |
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All
right, thank you for your time. |
