Zander Deetz ’15 wears his heart on his sleeve. Or more accurately, his chest.
On this mid-summer day, he’s sporting a self-designed T-shirt that was rejected as the chemistry department’s official student submitted option. The punchline has something to do with cycloadditions and ketene. It’s complicated.
“Even most chemistry majors didn’t get the joke,” Deetz says, laughing. “At least that’s what I tell myself for why I didn’t win.”
If Deetz’s attachment to Carleton’s chemistry department is a bit more personal than usual, it’s with good reason. The hours he put into lab work as both a student and one of professor Matt Whited’s research assistants laid the groundwork for his next big challenge: Harvard grad school.
Deetz is one of 12 Carls who have worked in Whited’s lab since his arrival in 2011. Half have graduated and enrolled in prestigious science-related PhD programs. All have been able to explore areas of hands-on research you won’t often find at liberal arts schools the size of Carleton.
“That was the most difficult part of getting a research program started up with undergrad students,” Whited says. “Figuring out what you want your niche to be so it allows you to find really interesting new phenomena, but also not be part of a scientific space where everyone else is trying to look.”
He has focused his research on chemical synthesis and reaction discovery, searching for new ways to make and transform interesting molecules. “We look for the most inert chemical substances — molecules with exceptionally strong bonds like carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide — and custom design extraordinarily reactive metal complexes to deconstruct them,” Whited says.
“As soon as we can start performing these challenging reactions, a whole new set of questions opens up: What is so special about our systems? How can we generalize these findings? What can we tweak to make things work even better?”
As the lab reveals those details, all kinds of new scientific possibilities are on the table: Applications in pharmaceutical synthesis, fuel transformation, and harnessing the energy in sunlight.
But those are big picture concepts, Whited says. His lab is engaged in the initial discovery process, and Carleton’s strength is giving students intimate lab opportunities with experienced faculty advisers. By experimenting with elements in the Carleton research lab, undergrads like Deetz take full ownership of the findings.
“The most empowering moments in the lab are when Matt says, ‘How would you figure this out? What experiment would you run?’ He knows the chemistry better, but in a lot of ways, I know the project better,” Deetz says.
“To be at that level, where you’re not just being taught, but you’re collaborating — that’s a pretty special place to see yourself.”
For Whited, science is ultimately about asking questions — not always answering them. After all, there’s an entire periodic table to play with, so the opportunities for critical inquiry are essentially endless.
Students have to enjoy the process of digging deeper. And while co-authoring published papers—which several Carls have done—is a nice feather in the cap for an undergrad, Whited never wants to lose sight of the real value when the safety goggles go on.
“Students get their best science education when they have to deal with problems where the answers are unknown,” he says. “Those are authentic research experiences. It gives you skills and perspective that you can take into any field for the rest of your life.”
PROFILES IN TEACHING
Matt Whited, Assistant Professor of Chemistry
- At Carleton since 2011
- Education: Davidson College, California Institute of Technology, University of Southern California
- Sample courses taught: Organometallic Chemistry, Principles of Chemistry, Inorganic Chemistry
- Teaching and research interests: Inorganic synthesis, kinetics of chemical reactions, physical inorganic and photochemistry, the chemistry of energy
- Hometown: Raleigh, North Carolina