Tilde cafe discussions always bear the promise of good weather, and so it was this past Saturday. Stony Creek was definitely the place to be, not only because of the wonderful weather, but because Professor Mark Johnson gave us a glimpse into The Wild World of Electrified Water. Chemistry graduate students Arron Wolk and Andrew Deblase played a supporting role and showed us a simple experiment (go to the 19 min point in the video of the afternoon, located at http://www.youtube.com/user/tildecafe) on how water can conduct electricity - but only when it contains other materials in it, such as salt. Using a simple observation like this, John Fenn, a former Yale professor with ties to Branford, developed a technique that finds wide use today in the analysis of proteins, carbohydrates and nucleic acids - electrospray ionization. For developing this method, Professor Fenn was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2002, along with Koichi Tanaka and Kurt Wuthrich.

more>>