At this year’s State of the Sciences, faculty members from the Wilson College of Textiles, along with students from their labs, planned colorful activities for participants to learn about the science of dyes, pigments and polymers. The State of the Sciences is an annual public outreach event put on by the College of Science to showcase ways science touches every part of our lives through interactive activities. It took place this year on April 11 at the James B. Hunt Jr. Library.
“It’s important for me and my lab to participate in events like State of the Sciences so that others – especially young students – can see women, and particularly minority women, doing science,” Assistant Professor Tova Williams Cherry says. “My laboratory is predominantly female-led, and as an African American scientist, I want to be visible in a space where representation still lags.”
Williams Cherry’s group planned two hands-on activities for their “Colorful Chemistry: Color-Changing Wolves” experience. In the first activity, participants screen-printed wolf designs with a special synthetic pigment that changes with heat, watching the wolf come to life in color under their fingers.
“These experiences are also valuable for graduate students in my laboratory. They get to practice communicating science to broad audiences and inspire others by sharing their own journeys,” Williams Cherry says. “And in doing so, we hope to raise awareness of polymer and color chemistry—one of science’s best-kept secrets that we’re working to make a lot less secret.”
In the second activity, Williams Cherry’s group introduced a natural dye that changes color with pH so participants could watch it shift colors with acid or base and measure the color change.
“I love showing science to young people because they are excited to discover a new fact or experiment and have an innate curiosity,” M.S. textile chemistry student Madi Petri says. “It is refreshing to see a smile over an experiment I see every day. It reminds me that science is awesome!”
Assistant Professor Januka Budhathoki-Uprety and her graduate student researchers – Xander Boltinhouse, Madi Petri and Hussain K. Chowdhury – also prepared two activities that show how polymers are useful for different things. In the first activity, participants experimented with polymers, learning how they can protect drugs, facilitate targeted delivery of therapeutics and minimize side effects.
“I enjoy engaging with the community and inspiring curiosity, and it was a great opportunity to share knowledge in a fun way to help kids get excited about how science can be applied in real-world scenarios,” fiber and polymer science graduate student Hussain Kawsar Chowdhury “Dhrubo” says. “We used food color dyes as drug mimics and encapsulated the dyes in sodium alginate polymers from seaweed to show them how polymers can be useful in applications like drug delivery.”
In the second activity, they mixed polymer solution from glue and borax solution to create children’s play slime. They also used molecular model kits to demonstrate how polymer chains can be entangled to form polymer networks, capture water and turn into slime. Both activities show how versatile polymer materials could be in applications from fun-filled play stuff to advanced technologies such as targeted drug delivery.
“For me and my team, participation in this event is important for two main reasons,” Budhathoki-Uprety says. “The first is to inspire the young generation of students to pursue STEM education. As science and technology are integral parts of modern human life, developing the STEM workforce pipeline is important for continued innovation and broader societal impact. The second is to make connections with future generations of prospective students – future talent recruiting for our college. Our participation at the State of Sciences event has allowed us to make connections with future generations of students who now have heard about textiles and science at an early age.”
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