I just snagged first class honours in theoretical chemistry. Now I can chill out. Maybe get some art done, address the slightly more than 1000 messages waiting for me on DA. I feel rather validated. I'm a genuine geek-nerd.

Furthermore, comrade ~muffin-wrangler neatly and wholly unsurprisingly kicked arse in her subjects, so go congratulate her.

I'm off to buy a damn ANU t-shirt and wear it with obnoxious smugness, leaning back against a wall, arms crossed, nodding and saying things like 'Yeah, atoms, I know what they are...'

Well, a few days ago I received my 2nd DD, which boosts my confidence in my art somewhat. But now I have 1011 messages, which will take some time to whittle down...

Thanks to everyone who has commented, favourited and such. If I don't get to specifically replying to you, you still have my gratitude.

Status Update:

Firstly, the animation that ~muffin-wrangler and ~m4nt15 did for my birthday is utterly next-level: [link]

Secondly, I've gotten all of my coursework grades back, and I'm running a HD average which puts me in good stead for the upcoming:

THESIS: A Mighty Tome
SEMINAR: A Petition to The Guardians Of Dark Mysteries
DEFENSE: Bravely Answer The Questions of The Guardians
CRAB BATTLE: Battle The Crab
NARFLE THE GARTHOK: 'I have learned much from watching the Garthok battle. It has weaknesses. I believe I can take it.'

Rob (my supervisor) is currently down with the Yates group in Tasmania, he said he will try to get some tips on running some sims in the obscenely high level of theory (Coupled Cluster) that they are pros in down there. I've heard bad stories about just how computationally expensive CC is and we've soberly discussed ways to hopefully not bring the supercomputer to its knees.

Finally, I've made a summer scholarship application to do theoretical research into free-radical degradation of DNA with the Coote group at the Research School of Chemistry at ANU, hopefully I will get in.

Oh yes, the Synaesthalcyone came out top in the CA poll, so now I have my very own COW icon

I am hard at work on my thesis, entitled Dinitrogen Activation via selected Metalla-calix[n]arenes: A Density Functional Theory study. It has to fit in 40 pages plus appendices. I have until the 25th of July to bash out a midyear. I have successfully used the phrase "may or may not influence the apical angle of the macrocycle frustum" in a meaningful english sentence. It rolls off the tongue delightfully.

Essentially most of the research is done and I did very well (against expectations) in the coursework components, including colloid and surface chemistry and 'diastereoinductive aldol reactions in natural product synthesis'; A topic so provincialised that there are not really any text books that cover it, just a few journal papers. The exam was 2 questions (count them).

I present for your pleasure some molecule names that popped up:

- Roflamycoin
- Roxatoxin
- Ylidiyl (actually a fragment)

Oh yeah, I am now a member of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute, a learned society for chemists (shock). I get a journal/magazine with review format articles, a scandalous number of spectrometer ads and a cryptic chemistry crossword. It's like NewScientist except it doesn't suck and it's all chem. It also makes my desk look dignified. I approve.

I demonstrated for the 1st year students and happily no one got hurt, and most appeared to learn something, however we all know that appearances can be deceptive. It does however seem that some people are just too damned fashionable to be OH&S-conscious chemists, with their high heels elegantly clicking and their unbuttoned lab coats billowing behind them in slow motion as they walk into a lab that is NOT A FREAKING C.S.I. MIAMI SET. Seriously people. Do you see me wearing big black shades and cracking deadpan one-liners in a gravelly voice under the insufficient light of moody blue fluorescents? You do not. That happens in 3rd year. You'll be able to put samples into a spectrometer and dramatically announce "Colonel Mustard in the library with a wrench!"

I have just commenced my honours year at ANU, under Prof. Rob Stranger. I will be using quantum mechanical computational methods to simulate the behaviour of para-tert-butylcalix[4]arene niobium(IV), a funky bowl shaped molecule that has an extraordinary ability to grab either end of a nitrogen molecule and make its formidable triple bond¹ significantly weaker². This makes it more amenable to useful reactions³.

I will hopefully get access to the ANU supercomputing facility, a massively parallel system with almost 2000 CPUs and 5.6 terabytes of ram! Of course, you have to wait in queue, you get a limited time for your jobs to complete in, and you have to use a sensible number of processors. i.e. you have to be courteous.

I'm slightly frazzled from a month of working with the Stranger group (well the 4 members thereof who are in town) at a fairly breakneck pace, keeping 12 cores nice and toasty at once with lots of concurrent simulations. Germán copes graciously with my several-times-daily 'does this look reasonable to you?' interruptions/intermissions, which I'm reducing in frequency.

[1] One of the strongest chemical bonds known!

[2] Floriani, C. et al, Stepwise Reduction of Dinitrogen to Nitride Assisted by Niobium Bonded to Oxygen Donor Atoms: The Potential of Reduced Forms of Niobium Calix[4]arene, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 1998, 120, 437-438

[3] Discussed here: [link]

For some reason, I can view my marks on ISIS. I am thrilled and more than a little relieved to announce that I have achieved the following this semester:

SCOM2001 Science Communication: HD
GEOL2015 Chemistry of the Earth: HD
GEOL2019 Marine Palaeontology and Evolution: HD
CHEM2204 Environmental Chemistry: D

Furthermore, I have been approved for conferring of:

Bachelor Of Science (Organic Chemistry / Inorganic Chemistry)

I am a scientist!

Now for Honours, under Prof. Rob Stranger [link]
There's going to be so much honour! Like 300 or The Last Samurai, but no-one needs to die!

Tasks:

- Get crowbar / Aperture Science Weighted Companion Cube / Aperture-Science-Thing-We-Don't-Know-What-It-Does
-Wash Lab Coat
- Silkscreen Black Mesa / Aperture Science logo onto Lab Coat
- Attack Erin's headcrab

I am also working on Last Man Standing 3, as well as teaching myself XAML and Windows Presentation Foundation! (And incidentally loving it, XAML is awesome)