July 13, 2007

A rising senior at Presbyterian College is making the most of her summer – engaging in six weeks of undergraduate research courtesy of the college's inaugural Summer Fellows Program.

Rachael Hinson, a chemistry major from Dillon, S.C., is working with Dr. Ed Gouge, PC's Daniel Professor of Chemistry, using synthetic methods to build similar molecules with different bulk – resulting in changes to the compound. Creating new compounds and viewing them through the college's UV spectrometer, Hinson said their research is time-consuming and difficult – but well worth it.

"It's very tedious – but I'm learning a lot of stuff that I never would have been exposed to in the regular classroom," she said. "So, would I love to do it for the rest of my life? Probably not. I like to change things; I like to do different things every day. But I think it's a great experience.

"(The research) is a lot of waiting – a lot of doing the same distillations over and over again. Just a lot of trial and error because we don't know what we're gong to get because these compounds have never been made before."

Nonetheless, a summer dominated by chemistry has been great, said Hinson.

"I never mind being in the lab," she said. "I would rather be in the lab than in the classroom. I'm more of a hands-on learner. I really enjoy it."

Hinson said she also enjoys working with Gouge, who did similar research during his doctoral work.

"He's my adviser and I love working with him," she said. "I'm really interested in how all of this chemistry works. It's a lot of organic chemistry and that's probably the chemistry course I was most interested in so far at PC."

Though Gouge checks in with her throughout the day and supervises each day's set of tasks, Hinson gets the chance to "roll with it" and take charge of the day-to-day work.

"I look at myself as a director or a consultant who recommends a plan or direction then stays out of the way," he said.

Gouge added that Hinson already has the traits of a good researcher – curiosity, patience, and persistence.

"She is a diligent worker – very neat and orderly," he said. "She is very methodical in her approach and has a good eye for detail. Rachael asks a lot of questions but she is also mature enough to make some of her own decisions and demonstrate good chemical initiative."

That initiative has also presented Hinson with a great opportunity to be a scientist this summer.

"Her work has been closer to pure chemistry that what we do in the classroom labs because we know the outcomes there," Gouge said. "What she's working on now – we don't know what's going to happen. It's pure science. This is the scientific method – having an hypothesis, testing it, and getting results that may change our theories." 

Hinson will make science a career. Already she has participated in an internship shadowing a medical examiner in Newberry and plans to enroll in medical school or engage in graduate school studies in the biomedical field after she graduates from PC. She also hopes fellow students will enjoy some of the same experiences by taking part in the Summer Fellows Program.

"I definitely think it's been a positive summer for me," she said. "I've learned new stuff. I've been able to interact with professors on a different level. I've been exposed to new things that I wouldn't have in the classroom.

"If you're really interested in your field of study, I definitely encourage it because you can get into stuff you wouldn't be able to in the summer and during the school year. I think it's a great thing that PC is doing to bring in new students – the fact that we have our own summer research program. You don't have to go somewhere else. You can do it here – where you know what's going on and you know the people."

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