ACS Career Fair
Despite significant updates and modernization efforts, the ACS national meeting career fair continues to see declining employer participation. Additionally, only 10–12% of members typically attend ACS national meetings and would have an opportunity to participate in such career fairs. To meet the needs of more of our members and increase the member-to-employer ratio, ACS jump-started a pilot local career fair tour to meet more members, connect with local employers, and expand the career fair beyond the national meeting. Trial events are being hosted in Houston, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Augusta, Ga.
These local career fairs will embody features of the national meeting career fair, including career pathway workshops, career consulting, and on-site interviews by participating employers with open positions. In partnership with the local ACS sections, these fairs aim to become a viable resource for those who are looking to start their career, make a career change, or find a new opportunity after a layoff. Through these efforts, CEPA will build stronger relationships with employers to help understand their needs and connect them with ACS members.What do you think of this idea? I think it's interesting, but still requires employers to get off their collective duffs, get out from behind their computer systems and their online ads, and go and meet with potential employees. I am skeptical that they will, but maybe I'm wrong... (are they getting desperate enough?)
Potential perils are in plain sight: An intense and unpredictable tariff battle is alarming businesses across the country. The annual federal deficit is heading toward $1 trillion. Credit card debt is soaring. And the synchronous wave that lifted every world economy at the year’s start has dissipated.
So what?
Such risks have done little to puncture the exuberant optimism that is encouraging American businesses to ramp up hiring and consider new investment.
The confidence is rooted only partly in hard-nosed data, like the rapid pace of growth expected for the second quarter and record low jobless rates. It is also a sign of harder-to-measure sentiment. “Animal spirits are high,” said Tim Ryan, United States chairman of the global accounting and consulting firm PwC, referring to the gut feelings and impulses that can drive economies to elation or despair.So what's it like where you are? Where I am, things seem pretty good, and we expect to have a decent year next year. Who knows what 2020 brings?
Josh Harry Isler, a 55-year-old former technical services manager for DuPont, faces up to 15 years in prison and a fine of up to $500,000 after pleading guilty to theft of fuel-enzyme-related intellectual property and making a false statement to the FBI. Isler, who lives in St. Ansgar, Iowa, admitted that in August 2013 while still a DuPont employee—but after having accepted a job from CTE Global, a competitor in the fuel enzymes business—he transferred hundreds of DuPont’s electronic files to an external device.
Many of the files related not just to DuPont but to the firm’s customers, some of whom were also customers—or potential customers—of CTE Global. Isler later transferred some files to his new employer. Isler is waiting to learn if he must pay DuPont compensation.
The theft of trade secrets has been a recurrent issue for DuPont in recent years. In 2017, the firm charged an employee of 27 years with stealing trade secrets relating to flexographic printing, and in 2014 a former engineer working in DuPont’s titanium dioxide business was convicted of selling trade secrets to a Chinese firm.
The Hunter Lab at The Rowland Institute at Harvard is now accepting applications for a
Postdoctoral Fellow position starting Fall-Winter 2018/2019.
The Hunter Group will focus on developing molecules and materials for sustainable large-scale industrial processes, such as solar-driven seawater splitting, electrochemical nitrogen fixation and CO2 reduction, and selective hydrocarbon oxidation. The position will involve computational screening, synthesis, and characterization of molecular and heterogeneous catalysts. Candidates with expertise in all related areas of inorganic and materials chemistry are encouraged to apply. In particular, candidates should address their knowledge of and/or willingness to learn the following desired skills:
The candidate will benefit from the experience of building a new lab, close contact with the PI (Dr. Bryan Hunter), and the interdisciplinary environment fostered at the Rowland Institute at Harvard and Harvard University.
Applications will be considered beginning September 1, 2018, with full consideration given to applications until the position is filled.Contact information and full ad here. Online ad here. Best wishes to those interested.
The Food and Drug Administration has announced a voluntary recall of a widely prescribed blood pressure medication made in China, reviving fears about the safety of imported drugs.
Three companies that sell the generic drug, valsartan, in the United States agreed to recall it after the F.D.A. said it might be tainted by N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA), considered a probable human carcinogen. The agency is still investigating, but said the contamination was believed to be related to changes in the way that valsartan was manufactured.
All of the valsartan that is being recalled was made in China by the same company, Zhejiang Huahai Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. It is distributed in the United States by three companies: Major Pharmaceuticals; Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, Ltd.; and Solco Healthcare. Solco, which is owned by Huahai Pharmaceutical, had about 45 percent of the market in 2017, according to John Brito, of Fore Pharma, the market research firm.How much do you want to be that Zhejiang Huahai has a change control with a Teva signature on it? (probably not.)
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| Boston University Credit: @chemtoolman |
The American Historical Association last week released a comprehensive snapshot of the entire discipline’s Ph.D. recipients. The project, Where Historians Work, tries to track where all of the 8,500 people who earned a doctorate from 2004 to 2013 landed jobs. About 7 percent of the recipients could not be found....
...Critics of the value of a history Ph.D. may find fodder in the history association’s project. Hover over some of the tiniest bubbles on an interactive slide, those representing just a single person, and you’ll see examples of people who may not have needed their Ph.D. for their current jobs: a rental-car clerk. A maintenance worker. An actor. A postal worker.
But the biggest bubbles tell a more hopeful story about the utility of a history Ph.D. The data show that those who earned history Ph.D.s in that time include 174 chief executives, 363 higher-education administrators, 320 nonprofessors doing history, 57 curators, and 82 editors. The point: History Ph.D.s don’t just stay in academe. They are everywhere.I admire this survey, and I encourage each field to do more of them. However, I find this trope of "they are everywhere" to be completely useless. Rather than saying "this is what you can do" or worse yet, "here is a story of one history Ph.D. who succeeded", I think it's far more useful to tell students and potential students "this is what you are likeliest to do, and here are the statistics to back that up."
1. Your firm failed to thoroughly investigate any unexplained discrepancy or failure of a batch or any of its components to meet any of its specifications, whether or not the batch has already been distributed (21 CFR 211.192).
Your firm invalidated out-of-specification (OOS) results without adequate investigation and scientific justification. Examples include:
....In March, 2017, you obtained OOS results for the [redacted] impurity during stability testing of [redacted] injection batches [redacted]. You suspected the analyst may have incorrectly rinsed the HPLC vials. New samples prepared and tested by a second analyst using both the original column and a new column, as well as old and new vials, also yielded OOS results. Although you lacked sufficient evidence, your investigation concluded that the OOS results were due to sample vial contamination. You invalidated the OOS results after obtaining passing results from testing retain samples.Rinsing HPLC vials??!?!?
The life sciences journal eLife is trying out a radical approach to peer review. Rather than deciding whether to publish a paper after peer review, an editor’s decision to send a paper for peer review will be a commitment to eventually publish it. The trial is optional and aims to recruit 300 papers. In the trial, the editor and referees will agree on what they want authors to address.
The authors can then make revisions, including more experiments; respond to criticisms; or withdraw the paper completely. The referee reports, editor’s decision letter, and authors’ response will be published alongside the final article. Reviewers can choose whether to remain anonymous.
The aim is to give more power to authors, say eLife editors Mark Patterson and Randy Schekman in an editorial. They also hope it will strengthen the review process, with referees gaining a reputation for the advice they give. Observers welcome the trial with caution. Raghuveer Parthasarathy, a physicist from the University of Oregon, worries that journal editors sifting through initial submissions are given more power. “It may bias the system further towards flashy papers from well-connected authors,” he says.This is a pretty interesting experiment, and it will be interesting to see if it produces anything sustainable...
BEIJING — At least 19 people have been killed and a dozen injured after a chemical plant exploded in southwest China, engulfing the plant in flames and throwing a thick plume of smoke into the sky.
The explosion erupted in an industrial park in Jiangan County, Sichuan Province, at about 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, the China News Service reported. Intense fires gutted a new-looking, three-story production building belonging to the Yibin Hengda Science and Technology Company, and windows of nearby buildings were shattered, a Sichuan news service said.
“I heard an enormous explosion, enormous, and felt tremors,” Liu Ping, an official in charge of the industrial park, told a Chinese news website. “We’re now checking DNA to confirm the list of fatalities.”
China’s grim record of accidents in factories and mines has improved in recent years, according to government statistics. They showed that 38,000 people died in work-related accidents last year, a fall of 12 percent from 2016.Sounds like it was a methanol plant, which would offer plenty of risk of explosion. Best wishes to those involved.
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| "Finally, we have found the Lost City of Acrolein!" Credit: cageclub.me |
4. Your firm failed to prepare batch production and control records with complete information relating to the production and control of each batch of drug product produced (21 CFR 211.188).Figuring out a way to accurately and robustly number manufacturing batches is a non-trivial task. Not numbering them at all is a pretty bold and simple solution!
You lacked complete information related to the production and control of each lot. For example, you failed to have specific identification for each lot of component, and production equipment, used in manufacturing. You also failed to have unique lot or control numbers for the distributed drug product. You provided our investigator with a list of more than [redacted] batches manufactured in 2017 that lacked this basic information.
In your response, you described your new lot numbering system and how you revised your production records. You also provided a copy of the revised production record.
Dow Chemical will pay the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission $1.75 million for failing to report $3.0 million in perks to former CEO Andrew N. Liveris, who retired on July 1. Among the benefits, SEC says, were travel to outside board meetings, sporting events, and personal activities; club memberships; and a board membership fee for a charity. SEC says Dow didn’t have the right system in place for sorting out and reporting such expenses.There's a software package I'd like to expense with my employer, maybe I could sneak a few Padres tickets in there too....
We invite applications for a postdoctoral position in organometallic chemistry at Reed College under the supervision of Dr. Miriam Bowring. This research position focuses on organometallic mechanisms, synthesis, and catalysis.
The postdoctoral researcher will develop homogeneous organometallic reactions with late transition metals for probing the causes and effects of large kinetic isotope effects. The position requires strong communication skills, since this work involves collaboration and supervision of undergraduate research projects. Applicants with a desire to mentor undergraduates, work independently, pursue external funding, and become an active member of the Reed community are preferred.Link to ad here. Best wishes to those interested.
Reed College is hiring a tenure-track chemist and we are interested in hearing from candidates with a broad range of background and training.
Please apply or share our ads with anyone who has interest in well-supported research and teaching at an undergraduate level. We value diversity and encourage applications from underrepresented groups.Link to ad here. Best wishes to those interested.
FORT COLLINS, Colo. (CBS4) – A former professor at Colorado State University is facing a felony charge for fabricating an outside job offer to improve his status at CSU. Professor Brian McNaughton, 40, ran the McNaughton Lab, a biochemistry research group at CSU.
He is now charged with attempt to influence a public official, for presenting his employers with a fictitious offer letter from the University of Minnesota in order to get more money from CSU.
The falsification was determined through a series of emails between leaders of the two schools. CBS4 obtained the conversations through a Colorado Open Records Act Request.
“It is my understanding this letter is simply a fake,” wrote Dr. Dan Bush, Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs at CSU. “Needless to say we are shocked and dismayed that one of our faculty would fabricate such a letter to advance the status at CSU.” “Quite shocking indeed!” wrote Tom Hays, Professor at University of Minnesota. “I can confirm that I did not write, nor sign an offer letter to Brian McNaughton during my interim term (2014-2015) as Dean of College of Biological Sciences at the University of Minnesota.”
McNaughton resigned his position at CSU. In a letter to the Dean, McNaughton apologized for an “enormous mistake.” He wrote that he got the idea to fake the outside offer from colleagues.
“It was openly stated that multiple former CSU faculty (now either dead or no longer affiliated with CSU) lied about an outside offer as a mechanism to improve their salary,” McNaughton wrote. “I’m not excusing it, and I’m not excusing my own actions, but these factors are real.”From conversations with professors at research universities, I have heard departments basically demand an outside offer before considering a pay raise. That said, I think this is reasonably common in many industries (particularly financially-related industries?). I imagine that the demanded raises are relatively large (greater than 10%?)
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| Credit: Wikimedia |
Reed College is hiring a tenure-track chemist and we are interested in hearing from candidates with a broad range of background and training.
Please apply or share our ads with anyone who has interest in well-supported research and teaching at an undergraduate level. We value diversity and encourage applications from underrepresented groups.Link to ad here. Best wishes to those interested.
