Category: Hendingar
Gratulerer med dagen, Leiv!
Så er 9. juli her og vår kjære kollega professor Leiv Kr. Sydnes fyller 70 år! Vi gratulerer så mykje med dagen, vonar og reknar med at dagen blir brukt i godt festleg lag, og viser ellers til fyldig intervju i På Høyden.
HMS-dagen
Mandag 18. juni gjennomførte Kjemisk institutt HMS-dag på og nær Kalfaret Brygghus. SSU(Safety & SUstainability)-manager Tove Lind, Equinor, gav ei innføring i dei mange utfordringane ved Johan Castberg-feltet i Barentshavet, og spesielt bygging av ein god sikkerhetskultur i organisasjonen. For å få til eit kontinuerleg og ekte fokus på HMS er det nyttig å utvikle modellar og perspektiv på sikringstiltak. Gjeldande modell innan Equinor er vist i figuren.
Etter gjennomgang av arbeidsmiljøundersøkelsen for instituttet samt gruppearbeid med sikte mot forbetringstiltak, var det lunsj og deretter omvisning på verkstadar/laboratorium ved det nye fakultetet for Kunst, Design og Musikk (KMD). Av alt interessant var det litografiprosessen og kopling til kjemi som vakte størst interesse. Takk til ass. fakdir. 
Eli Høie for å ha arrangert omvisning for oss!
Etter ei ny fokusøkt kor PhD-utdanninga vår var tema, var det offisielle programmet ferdig. Mange ønskte å få med seg innføring i ølbrygging mens vi var i gamle Hansa-lokale, og det blei ei hyggeleg avrunding med lite spytting i glasa.
Fun day at Kronstad
Yesterday, EXPO-2018 took place at the Kronstad Campus of Western Norway University of Applied Sciences (HVL). 
Some 700 freshly minted engineers and economists presented their bachelor projects, about 270 in total, by way of posters, stands and enthusiasm. 
The picture shows the award-winning «best stand in show», featuring extraction and quantitative analysis of parabenes in on-campus-brewed beer. Focussing on the chemical and biochemical engineers, lots of talent was evident — hopefully more than a few of them show up as MSc-students in our departement over the summer? EXPO is an annual event — something to consider visiting next June?
Nathalie receives the prestigious Loew Lectureship Award
At the biannual President’s Meeting in ISQBP next week, Dr. Nathalie Reuter, as of July 1 Professor at the Chemistry department, will receive the Loew Lectureship Award! The International Society of Quantum Biology and Pharmacology (ISQBP) was founded by Professor Per-Olov Löwdin, who also served as the society’s first president. The eleventh President was Gilda H. Loew, in honour of whom the Loew Lectureship Award was established in 2004, and the 23rd President was this years recipient of said Award, namely Nathalie. 
In between, the list of former ISQBP Presidents include several Nobel prize laureates and other highly regarded scientists. We congratulate Nathalie on receiving the Loew Award in recognition of her high standing in a very competitive field of research!
In passing, it may be noted that the referred-to Professor Löwdin is also accredited with coining the research field Quantum Chemistry. He was the supervisor of Professor Rolf Manne, who in turn established this research field in Bergen, at the Chemistry department. It does make some sense that Nathalie receives the Loew Award and joins the Chemistry department at the same time!
In the Days of the Big Nano (pun not intended) Prizes
The local Nano-day was arranged today as previously announced on this channel – starting with oral presentations for the Nano100 students and finishing off with a public show of the posters that document their learning outcomes from a semester as interns in a research group. 
As usual, the competition for the honour as best poster in show was a close one, but with Ida and Morten as the unrivalled winning duo. Well done — to them and their fellow students!
It is fitting to point out that yesterday, the winners of the 2018 Kavli Prize winners in Nanoscience were officially announced. Quoting the Kavli foundation, The Kavli Prize in Nanoscience is awarded for outstanding achievement in the science and application of the unique physical, chemical and biological properties of atomic, molecular, macromolecular and cellular structures and systems manifested in the nanometer scale. This year, the prize was awarded for the invention of CRISPR-Cas9, the revolutionary nanotool for editing DNA, shared by Emmanuelle Charpentier of the Max Planck Society, Jennifer A. Doudna of the University of California, Berkeley, and Virginijus Šikšnys of Vilnius University.
Nanodagen 2018
På fredag 1. juni går Nanodagen 2018 av stabelen. Dette er både eksamensdag for NANO100-studentane og ei markering av nanostudiet ved UiB. I tidsrommet 14.15 – 15.00 stiller NANO100-studentane ut posterane sine fra vårens prosjektarbeid i ein offentleg postersesjon. Dette finn stad i Vrimlearealet 1. etasje, Realfagbygget. 
Du er hjarteleg velkomen til å møte nye og gamle nanostudentar og -veiledarar i samling rundt postarar og akkompagnert av litt sunn munngodt. Det naturlege høgdepunktet blir utdeling av årets posterpris! Dette er ein stolt tradisjon, og det opptil fleire dugande forskarar som først vekk avslørt sitt talent i denne samanhengen!
The LKS Symposium – A great success
After two days filled with modern chemistry, fond memories and about 80 participants paying tribute to professor Leiv Kr. Sydnes and his many contributions to chemistry, university and society, it is easy to conclude that the symposium has been a great success. Pro-Rector Margareth Hagen set the stage in the beautiful University Aula with her inspired opening words on Tuesday, nicely followed the highly acclaimed Audun Kayser reciting four pieces of Grieg. Leiv’s first PhD graduate, professor John Sigurd Svendsen, UiT, took the audience along for a most impressive and capturing journey that combined chemistry and entrepreneurship, and from there on one inspired lecture followed after the other, until professor Magne O. Sydnes, UiS, gave the last one today, titled Chemistry in the Sydnes Laboratories. 
Somewhere in the middle there was a very nice evening dinner, with speeches held and presents given, by profs. Yngve Stenstrøm, Trond Vidar Hansen, the fore-mentioned pro-rector, our dean, and quite a few others. The event was very well initiated and organised, thanks due to Hans-René Bjørsvik, Bengt Erik Haug, Bjarte Holmelid, Ole Heine Kvernenes, Marit Kristin Leiren and Stig Valdernes.
Sterk Bergen-kontingent på NKS rådsmøte
Norsk Kjemisk Selskap – NKS- har som formål «å virke for kjemiens fremme i samfunn, vitenskap, teknikk og undervisning, samt å representere norske kjemikere og ivareta deres faglige interesser». Verksemda blir leia av Hovudstyret, men det er Rådet som har øvste mynde. Det årlege rådsmøtet er dermed den avgjerande instansen i NKS, og for 2018 fann dette stad sist fredag. Bergen og UiB var godt representert ved Camilla Løhre samt firkløveret på biletet: Audun, Bengt Erik, Olav og Leiv Kr.
NKS var ei drivande kraft i markeringa av det internasjonale kjemiåret i 2011, og vi ser fram til ei tilsvarande synleggjering av kjemifaget i samband med feiringa av det internasjonale året for periodesystemet, 2019, 150 år etter at Dmitrij Mendelejev konstruerte det første periodesystemet. Vi siterer IUPAC: In proclaiming an International Year focusing on the Periodic Table of Chemical Elements and its applications, the United Nations has recognized the importance of raising global awareness of how chemistry promotes sustainable development and provides solutions to global challenges in energy, education, agriculture and health. Dette er ein lissepasning til NKS i deira arbeid for kjemiens fremme i samfunn, vitenskap, teknikk og undervisning.
Doctoral degree award ceremony
This week we have taken part in two dissertation ceremonies at our department, for Kjersti and Coralie. Those of you hanging in to the very end of these events, heard professor Francis state that the evaluation committee had accepted both the presentation and the defence and that the University Board would be notified accordingly. Some may wonder what happens next? The answer to this is the Doctoral degree award ceremony, in which the newly appointed Doctores receive their Latin diploma (with an English translation attached) in a formal ceremony in the University Aula, along with an official transcript that constitutes the authoritative documentation of the PhD degree to be presented when requested later in the career.
Today, there was Doctoral degree award ceremony taking place in the Aula, and three graduates from the Chemistry department received their diplomas: Annette, Festo and Andrey. Present to savor the moment and share in the victories, were their former supervisors (Doctor parents) and Hege ((c) photos)!
Congrats dr. Coralie!
Today Coralie Celine Quadri successfully and with stamina defended her PhD thesis, titled N-Heterocyclic Carbene Complexes of Titanium as a Novel Class of Catalysts for the Copolymerization of Cyclohexene oxide with CO2. She has spent a couple of years away from the department writing up her thesis, which made for nice reunions on this joyous event.