Chemistry Major
Chemistry, the central science, is fundamental to any discipline which seeks to understand the physical and biological world around us. At Franklin College, students may obtain either a major or a minor in chemistry. The major requires a minimum of 32 credit hours of chemistry courses in addition to courses in physics and mathematics. The attainment of a rewarding and satisfying career depends not only on the perseverance and hard work of the student, but also on the attention and resources provided by the institution. The small class size at Franklin gives students ample opportunity for close student-teacher interaction.
The undergraduate program in chemistry introduces the student to the collection of chemical principles, theories, and facts that have evolved in the more than 200 years that chemistry has existed as a science.
The program gives a student an opportunity to collect, to analyze, and to critically evaluate data in the laboratory, and to appreciate the relationship of factual data to scientific purposes, laws, and theories. The body of knowledge acquired and the experience gained in the use of modern instrumentation to collect and to analyze data, prepare a student for further study in chemistry at the graduate level, for the pursuit of a career in industrial chemistry or in a health science, and also serve as a chemistry knowledge base necessary for the study of other sciences, including medicine, biology, toxicology, and environmental science.
Finally, it is the aim of the department to help the student better understand the natural and the synthetic products and the processes that are encountered in everyday life, thus to satisfy the student's curiosity about the physical world.
Equipment
The chemistry department is committed to chemistry as an experimental science and therefore places heavy emphasis on laboratory work. Beginning in their sophomore year, students gain hands-on experience with modern instruments.
Some of the most high-tech equipment offered to you at Franklin includes:
- High Performance Liquid Chromatographs
- Gas Chromatographs
- Gas chromatograph/Mass Spectrometer
- Atomic Absorption Spectrophometer
- UV-Vis Spectrophotometer
- FT-IR Spectrometer
- Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectrometer
Most of our instruments have been recently purchased or upgraded by grants from the Memorial National College Grants Program of the Pittsburgh Conference and Professor Thomas Hodge Fund.
Career Opportunities
Opportunities abound for chemistry graduates in the general fields of basic research, product development, market research, criminalistics, teaching, as well as the health-related sciences such as medicine, dentistry, pharmacology, toxicology, and clinical chemistry. In general, one can appreciate the possibilities by examining a list of fields embarked upon by graduates of Franklin:
- Chemical research
- Chemical sales
- Computer Science
- Dentistry
- Engineering
- Environmental analysis
- Law
- Medicine
- Pharmacology
- Teaching
- Veterinary
Internships
Franklin’s Winter Term program is a unique part of the experience students receive at Franklin College. Winter Term, which takes place during the month of January, allows students the opportunity to begin taking advantage of their academic programs by performing internships.
Students may start participating in internships their sophomore year. The availability of the internship program at Franklin gives students the opportunity to gain academic credit by working with professionals in potential careers. Recently, one student had an opportunity to spend a Winter Term in the chemistry laboratory at Cilag Ltd., Schaffhausen, Switzerland. Other students have worked in the research laboratories of Eli Lilly & Co. and Dow Chemical, and have assisted medical doctors with their office and hospital duties. This first-hand experience can either confirm a chosen career or open other possibilities.
Students who anticipate either attending graduate school or obtaining a position in industry immediately upon graduation are strongly encouraged to undertake a research project, working along with a faculty member, as part of the chemistry curriculum.
Examples of the research projects in progress or undertaken by Franklin chemistry students have included:
- Enhanced infrared spectroscopy of lipid bi-layers and other thin film systems
- Reflectance spectroscopy of biomolecules
- The synthesis of medicinally important sulfur/nitrogen heterocycles
- Detection of alkaloids in tissue samples using high performance liquid chromatography and enzyme catalyzed reactions.
