A few of this week's issue of Chemical and Engineering News:
- Cover: Stephen K. Ritter on with a profile of prominent cold fusion researchers.
- I don't understand why a retired synthetic organic chemist was the voice of skepticism. Surely there were nuclear chemists willing to throw cold water on this field?
- Peter Dorhout is the new ACS President-Elect. (article by Linda Wang)
- A very interesting profile of a pioneer in the fine chemicals business, Peter Pollak (by Rick Mullin)
- This idea to prominently post the employer's consequences for safety violations might be a good one.
- Tardigrades are amazing! (article by Ryan Cross)
- Chinese CROs are beginning to get projects from Chinese biotech/pharma companies. (article by Jean-François Tremblay)
UPDATE: I should also congratulate Stephen Ritter on the most #chemjobs opening paragraph of the year:
Howard J. Wilk is a long-term unemployed synthetic organic chemist living in Philadelphia. Like many pharmaceutical researchers, he has suffered through the drug industry’s R&D downsizing in recent years and now is underemployed in a nonscience job. With extra time on his hands, Wilk has been tracking the progress of a New Jersey-based company called Brilliant Light Power (BLP).The "underemployed in a nonscience job" part makes it.
You're right, Ritter buried the lede: "ACS finds most chemists now employed in other fields; American chemical research becoming a faddish hobby like Lego Mindstorms for smart people with time on their hands."
ReplyDeleteWhen nearing graduation from the Georgia Tech Chemistry Department in 1962, I could see no chemistry job prospects so I got a job programming computers with wires.
ReplyDeleteI am 74 years old now and happily programming Android and Apple phones.
Recently, I looked at the current Georgia Tech course catalog and they are teaching the same old tired courses except now they have a computer degree.
My advice: Get out of chemistry now.