Job posting: program coordinator, Center for Autonomous Chemistry, UMass-Amherst

From the inbox, a program coordinator position at the Center for Autonomous Chemistry at the University of Massachusetts - Amherst:

The Program Coordinator for the Institute of Diversity Sciences and the Center for Autonomous Chemistry organizes and supports all programmatic activities related to the Institute of Diversity Sciences (IDS) and the Center for Autonomous Chemistry (CAC) at UMass Amherst. This position will manage the scheduling and logistics of research meetings, be responsible for annual reports and evaluations, oversee the IDS and CAC budgets, manage the seed grant application process for IDS, serve as liaison between IDS/CAC and their respective stakeholders on and off campus, keep records of IDS and CAC activities, and assist with communication strategies (website and social media development and maintenance).

CAC leadership notes that applications from scientists are welcomed. Full ad here. Best wishes to those interested.  

Post-it Notes

A list of small, useful things (links):

• The latest from Stellen für Chemiker
• The latest from All Things Metathesis
• Sustainable Nano on Valentine's Day and M&Ms.
• Prof. Yudin's two latest posts
• Kat Day on ruthenium
• This is an amazing story of a stolen chemistry paper at Retraction Watch
• The latest from the Baran Lab: an electrochemical version of the Birch reduction

An open invitation to all interested in writing a blog, a hobby that will bring 
you millions thousands hundreds tens of dollars joy and happiness. Send me a link to your post, and I'd be happy to put it up.

Have a good weekend!

Safety warning: injection of DCM

DCM injected into finger, after two hours (credit: Seb Vidal)

Via Twitter, the rather concerning photo at right from French chemist (Sebastien Vidal, who was not
the person affected). Here is the text, via his tweets (clarified for grammar):

Which solvent could have caused such injury after poking one's finger with a syringe and injecting 1-2 drops of solvent? 15 minutes and 2 hrs pictures (CJ's note: 2 hour picture shown) 

So this is dichloromethane. 

It got purple immediately then necrosis. Heat in the finger and nerve affected. Got surgery within 2 hr in ER. Self skin graft from his arm. 3 month recover.
Quite ok now. That was a huge shock for me. 

This is really to alert everyone about simply injecting DCM in a flask which turned in almost losing a finger if surgery was done too late. 

Surgeon had to remove dead flesh and self-graft was needed to reconstruct. Nerve was 90% damaged and regeneration was slow but nearly 70% ok now after 8 months. Painkillers did not help after 10 days and lots of rough night for him.

Well, I consider myself warned. Be careful out there. 

Got a career dilemma?

I'm always game for writing answer requests for advice in my column at Chemical and Engineering News. Please feel free to write me (chemjobber@gmail.com) if you have a career-oriented dilemma that you'd like me to write about in the magazine. Also, you can submit your questions with this handy web form. Thanks!

The Medicinal Chemist Jobs List: 305 positions

The Medicinal Chemist Jobs list (curated by Joel Walker and myself) has 305 positions.

Want to help out? Here's a Google Form to enter positions, but if you want to do the traditional "leave a link in the comments", that works, too.

Want to chat about medchem positions? Try the open thread.

Positions I'm not including: positions outside the United States, computational positions (this will likely change), academic positions (likely never.)

19 new positions at Organic Chemistry Jobs

Over at Common Organic Chemistry, there's 14 new positions for February 18 and 5 new positions posted for February 14.

The Analytical Chemistry Jobs List: 15 positions

The Analytical Chemistry Jobs List has 15 positions; this is curated by the ACS Division of Analytical Chemistry. Want to help out? Fill out this form. 

The Process Chemistry Jobs List: 277 positions

The Process Chemistry Jobs List has 277 positions.

Want to help? Here's a form to fill out.

Want to chat process jobs? Try the open thread. 

Warning Letter of the Week: wood burner edition

Via a friendly note from the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research to the Chairman and Managing Director of Vipor Chemicals Private Ltd. (Gujarat, India):

2.      Failure to have the procedures and processes necessary to ensure the API manufactured at your facility meet established specifications for quality and purity.
Batch Control
You do not have a procedure to control the issuance, usage, and reconciliation of batch manufacturing records (BMRs). Your production personnel record manufacturing activities in personal notebooks or on draft BMRs. Production managers then transcribe the data onto another BMR, which is then circulated to the production operators and supervisors for their signatures. Production management stated that drafts are incinerated in a wood burner. Your firm’s representative asked our investigator why such a practice was problematic.

 Have you tried sourcing a good shredder? They're expensive! 

Job posting: principal investigator, Nephron Technologies, Minneapolis, MN

From the inbox, a position with a new startup in Minneapolis, MN:

Job Title: Principal Investigator
Company Name: Nephron Technologies
Location: Minneapolis, MN 

Education Requirement: PhD or MS in Chemistry or Chemical Engineering or related field. 

Skills: Analytical chemistry, Chemical/Process Engineering, Electrical/Computer Engineering, Prototyping, Systems Analysis, Controls, Computer Programming, Mass Transport. 

Job Description: Nephron Technologies is a seed-stage startup company focused on revolutionizing dialysis technology. We are searching for a Principal Investigator to lead our proof-of-concept operations, contingent on award of an NIH SBIR Phase I grant. The term of employment begins as soon as the grant is awarded. If we are successful with the Phase I grant, which covers six months of work, we will apply for a Phase II grant, which covers an additional year of work. We will then seek other sources of funding to continue our efforts. 

Because this is a startup company, we cannot guarantee that this will be a stable source of employment. We can only employ you if we are successful with grants. Compensation will include equity in the company in addition to a salary. 

Your work will include designing and testing a benchtop dialysis device. We will collect data, write reports, and plan experiments. There may be an opportunity for publications. Because you will be a technical leader on the project, there is an opportunity to become an executive officer depending on how long you want to stay! 

Please email me only if you meet the requirements above, and you are seeking a fast-paced, high-risk, high-reward position like this. Unfortunately, we cannot support relocation. 

Contact Information: goodman.danielj@gmail.com

Best wishes to those interested.  

This week's C&EN

From this week's issue of Chemical and Engineering News:

• Cover: "Epitranscriptomics: The new RNA code and the race to drug it" (by Ryan Cross)
• Interview with James Comey, former FBI director and chemistry major (by Cheryl Hogue)
• Thanks to this article, I learned that the FBI's chief bomb expert has a Ph.D. in inorganic chemistry from Cornell. 
• Good earnings news in 2018 for pharma (by Ryan Cross)
• Cargill grows seaweed? (by Melody M. Bomgardner)
• Lonza's making cannabinoids in China? (by Rick Mullin)
• "MOFs make dialysis more efficient" (by Mitch Jacoby)
• Some d00d yapping about his wife.

The 2019 Chemistry Faculty Jobs List: 562 positions

The 2019 Chemistry Faculty Jobs List (curated by Andrew Spaeth and myself) has 562 positions.

Want to help out? Here's a Google Form to enter positions.

On February 20, 2018, the 2018 Chemistry Faculty Jobs List had 514 positions.

Interested in how this is tracking overall? Check out these sweet graphics done by Andrew Spaeth.

Want to chat? Here's a link to the current open thread.

Here's a link to the November 2018-January 2019 open thread. Here's the October/November thread. Here's the pre-September thread, here's the September/October thread.

Otherwise, all discussions are on the Chemistry Faculty Jobs List webforum.

2018-19 Chemistry Bumper Cars is at Marshall Brennan's site.

The Academic Staff Jobs List: 18 positions

The Academic Staff Jobs list has 18 positions.

This list is curated by Sarah Cady. It targets:

• Full-time STAFF positions in a Chem/Biochem/ChemE lab/facility at an academic institution/natl lab
• Lab Coordinator positions for research groups or undergraduate labs 
• and for an institution in Canada or the United States

Want to help out? Here's a Google Form to enter positions.

Want to chat about staff scientist positions? Try the open thread.

Update from St. Andrews

Credit: University of St. Andrews

A remarkably thorough report from St. Andrews, especially consider the fire happened 6 days before the report. As respected folks have noted on Twitter, at some point, it would be good to get more detail on this paragraph:

It began on the third floor of BMS late on Sunday afternoon when a routine post-experiment wash-up went wrong. Colleagues followed safety procedures to the letter – a fire blanket was used immediately to try to extinguish the first flames in room 305, and when that failed they raised the alarm and evacuated.

I'll note that I don't have a ton of experience fighting serious fires, i.e. most of the laboratory fires that I have dealt with (three or four) have been instances where a fire extinguisher was sufficient to put out the flames. There is an aspect of "I will get this thing back under control" that I am sure every laboratory chemist feels, but fire is a beast unto itself, and I am guessing there are insufficient fire extinguishers in the typical laboratory to deal with, say, a working 8-foot hood doing organic chemistry that has gone up and is emitting 4-5 foot flames. (Note: I am not a chemical safety expert, nor a fire expert.)

Be careful out there, folks. Glad to hear that everyone at St. Andrews is safe. 

View From Your Hood: Seattle sunset edition

Credit: Indrek Kalvet

Via a reader Indrek Kalvet: "The otherwise gorgeous view from our lab looking over the Seattle skyline and the Olympic mountains got a serious upgrade by this beautiful sunset."

(got a View from Your Hood submission? Send it in (with a caption and preference for name/anonymity, please) at chemjobber@gmail.com; will run every other Friday.)

The Medicinal Chemist Jobs List: 298 positions

The Medicinal Chemist Jobs list (curated by Joel Walker and myself) has 298 positions.

Want to help out? Here's a Google Form to enter positions, but if you want to do the traditional "leave a link in the comments", that works, too.

Want to chat about medchem positions? Try the open thread.

Positions I'm not including: positions outside the United States, computational positions (this will likely change), academic positions (likely never.)

19 new positions at Organic Chemistry Jobs

Over at Common Organic Chemistry, there's 19 new positions posted for February 4.

The Analytical Chemistry Jobs List: 14 positions

The Analytical Chemistry Jobs List has 14 positions; this is curated by the ACS Division of Analytical Chemistry. Want to help out? Fill out this form. 

The Process Chemistry Jobs List: 274 positions

The Process Chemistry Jobs List has 274 positions.

Want to help? Here's a form to fill out.

Want to chat process jobs? Try the open thread. 

Warning Letter of the Week: ship it! edition

In a letter from the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research to the general manager of Hangzhou Guoguang Touring Commodity Co., Ltd.:

2. Your firm failed to establish an adequate quality control unit with the responsibility and authority to approve or reject all components, drug product containers, closures, in-process materials, packaging materials, labeling, and drug products (21 CFR 211.22(a)). 

Your quality unit failed to exercise its authority to approve, release, and distribute OTC drug products before all analytical testing was completed and reviewed. In addition, your firm approved and released OTC drug products that did not meet their final specification. For example:

• For [redacted] batches of [redacted], your sales manager was provided with test results from your contract laboratory that were out of specification [redacted] for [redacted] assay. The batches were distributed without the quality unit’s review of the failing test results.
• A batch of [redacted] (Lot [redacted]) was released by your quality unit on August 3, 2017, and was shipped on August 7, 2017, before your firm received the results of assay testing. 

In your response, you provided an updated standard operating procedure and the associated training records concerning the release of OTC drug products with inadequate quality oversight. However, your response is inadequate because you have not determined the root cause of this violation.

 Eh, the assay probably would have shown the material to be in spec anyway... ship it!