With the assistance of Jack and practice I was soon making silyl functionalized PIBs necessary for the research project. With the exception of holidays or when he was out on travel I submitted monthly reports to Dr. “Kennedy” (see examples below). As the project progressed I slowly became aware of the fact that Dr. “Kennedy” had very little insightful input to give in regards to problems that I was experiencing in the condensation of these arms into stars. Another thing that I continued to encounter were issues related to equipment failures, mostly in the dry box that I used but also in instrumentation (e.g. GPC and NMR). At times progress was hampered by the fact that I was becoming routinely ill with severe difficulty in breathing, something that was abnormal for me. Regardless of the setbacks, I was able to figure out alternative methods (e.g. nonhydrolytic sol-gel synthesis) that led to improved yields of star polymers and within approximately one year following the beginning of laboratory work I had amassed enough data to deliver my formal talk as required by the polymer science department (see below).
Shortly after this talk (4-15-00) a physician informed me that my health problems were due to severe asthma and it was speculated that a major factor in causing this (which I did not have prior) could have been due to exposure to volatile reagents in the “Kennedy” lab. Unfortunately, while at U. Akron I never once received any formal safety training and had been exposed to some unsafe practices in the handling of solvents commonly used in the “Kennedy” lab. From that point forward I began to incrementally implement safer handling procedures when it came to use of reagents; however, I had already suffered the physical damage that they could cause. Sadly this was but one bit of bad news to occur during this period as the reader will see…
Report Si 4_4_99 Report Si 6_4_99 Report Si 7_8_99 Report Si 8_18_99 Report Si Nov_99 Report Si Dec_99 Report Si 2_5_00