MTSU’s Gets New Cutting-Edge Chemistry Equipment

Through faculty effort, MTSU’s Department of Chemistry recently procured almost $900,000 in grants to secure multiple pieces of state-of-the-art instrumentation for students and faculty.

Middle Tennessee State University chemistry faculty, from left, Charles Chusuei, Sing Chong and Beng Guat Ooi are shown Thursday, Aug. 18, at the Science Building on campus in front of a specialized Raman confocal microscope, one of the department’s four recently acquired, cutting-edge pieces of chemistry instrumentation that they hope will expand research and hands-on experience opportunities for faculty and students. (MTSU photo by J. Intintoli)

“Training on modern instrumentation gives MTSU chemistry undergraduate and graduate students an employment advantage,” said Andrienne Friedli, project participant and former department chair. “The new instruments are important for the department because these state-of-the-art tools allow us to obtain research results that are respected by the chemical community and can be published in high quality journals. In an academic research setting, publications demonstrate productivity.”

Friedli said obtaining this level of equipment at MTSU also makes it more accessible for other students in the region.

“Not only do departmental students use research-grade instrumentation in laboratory coursework and research projects, but students at primarily undergraduate institutions in the region that do not have research-rich environments are also welcomed,” Friedli said. “Our willingness to share equipment and expertise allows more students in the region to get exposed to and experienced on this equipment that employers will recognize and appreciate.”

Middle Tennessee State University chemistry faculty, from left, Sing Chong, Beng Guat Ooi and Mike Zhang work together on the department’s new and state-of-the-art ultra-high performance liquid chromatograph coupled to a high resolution mass spectrometer on Thursday, Aug. 18, at the Science Building on campus. The device is one of four recently acquired, cutting-edge pieces of chemistry instrumentation that several faculty helped acquire through grant funds with hopes to expand research and hands-on experience opportunities for faculty and students. (MTSU photo by J. Intintoli)

Faculty Sing Chong, Mike Zhang and Justin Miller spearheaded the instrumentation grants and were awarded both external funding from the National Science Foundation and internal match funding from the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs and the university’s Technology Access Fee fund. The department was funded to purchase four major pieces of equipment — a Raman microscope, two mass spectrometers and a fluorometer.

To learn more about opportunities at MTSU’s Department of Chemistry, visit the website at https://www.mtsu.edu/chemistry/.

To learn more about the opportunities available through MTSU’s Office of Research and Sponsored Programs, visit the website at https://www.mtsu.edu/research/.