I am a graduate of the University of Southern California with a Ph.D. in Organic and Polymer Chemistry. I have gained experience in many branches of chemistry and materials science, including: experimental design, materials design, synthesis, purification, characterization, method development, optical spectroscopy, electro-chemistry, data analysis, and failure analysis.
The name of my site comes from a term involved in one of the instruments that I worked with quite a bit, an NMR, otherwise known as a nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer. According to the IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, a chemical shift is essentially when signals are positioned higher or lower than a known standard. This distance from that standard, along with the line shape (or splitting pattern) and the area under the peaks, can be used to identify a molecule’s structure.
Outside of chemistry, I enjoy cooking, photography, web design and working with computers. I use multiple operating systems while at home: Windows 7 RC, Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005, Windows XP Professional, Windows XP Home, Mac OS X 10.4.11, and various distributions of Linux. I also run Mac OS 8.1, Mac OS 9.2.2, Windows 98 Second Edition, and others, when I need to use older software suited to particular tasks.
Here’s a concise bio about me:
- Grew up in Florida.
- Went to private schools until first half of fifth grade.
- Went to public schools from then until twelfth.
- Went to local college for undergrad.
- Worked in a pharmacy through undergrad.
- Got chemistry job near undergrad after graduation.
- Met future wife, dated for a few years, and then got engaged.
- Got married, quit job, moved to Texas for grad school, all within two weeks.
- Moved with research advisor to California after a year in Texas.
- Graduated from graduate school with my Ph.D. in Chemistry.
- Got a postdoc position in the high desert of California.
- Worked at a start up developing sensor technology in Delaware.
- Working on commercial and government projects for technology development in Pennsylvania.