Issue date: 7/20/05 Section: News

Ravi Garach - The Battalion. Shawn Fitch, a graduate student in chemistry, performs an experiment to analyze a crystal using X-ray diffraction Tuesday. He is a TA for Chemistry 101 sections.

Ten years from now, the plastics created by Shawn Fitch and his research companions may be used every day. Even if the students in the Chemistry 101 lab sections for which he is a teaching assistant (TA) do not know the impact that Fitch's research had on the world, they will know the difference that he made in their education.

Fitch, who is enrolled in a 5-year doctorate program in chemistry, said he has a large workload. He said he and his fellow classmates spend around 60 hours a week at school.

"We are required to teach three sections," Fitch said. "We have a weekly research group meeting where research and literature is presented. We are required to do three hours of Help Desk. And any time that we are not doing any of that, we are doing research in the lab."

He is willing to take on such a heavy load because he hopes it will give him the experience necessary to be successful in the chemistry field.

"I would like to go into government and industry labs and work with plastics," Fitch said.

Marcetta Darensbourg, a chemistry professor who is working in a joint effort with Fitch's research, said Fitch's research efforts have already begun.

"Shawn's interests are currently in synthetic chemistry, and he is preparing catalysts with potential for application to various polymer and co-polymer processes," Darensbourg said.

Fitch said he hopes his research will be beneficial to the environment.
"The ultimate goal of our research group is to create a greener route to polycarbonates, which make bulletproof glass and other types of plastic," Fitch said. "It usually requires pretty harmful chemicals, like mustard gas, but we are looking into cleaner ways to do it."

Fitch said that it is difficult to create a cleaner polymer process that people will actually use regardless of its environmental benefits.

"We may make the best catalyst in the world and the cleanest polymer, but if it is one cent more expensive, they won't use it," Fitch said. "The likelihood of us creating the solution that is used is kind of slim, but we are constantly gaining useful knowledge."

Continued...

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