Chemistry News

After serving 22 years as a Reed chemist, and the past two years as Acting Dean of the Faculty, Prof. Pat McDougal has decided to retire from Reed effective June 1, 2013. A retirement celebration will be held during Reedfayre 2013 on Friday, June 14, 2:15-4:15 PM, in Vollum Lounge.

Practically since his arrival at Reed in fall 1990, Pat has enjoyed iconic status among chemistry students as a maker of molecules, and among faculty and administrators as a source of wisdom on all things Reed. Pat’s enthusiasm for chemistry and his devotion to Reed students can be seen in the large number of academic offspring who have found jobs as synthetic chemists, either as faculty or in the chemical industry.

While Pat is well-known across campus for his teaching contributions in Chem 202, 343 (re-dubbed years ago by worshipful Reedies as “Advanced Pat”), 470, and Senior Symposium, few members of the community were aware of his pre-Reed history as an organic chemistry graduate student/TA in the late 70’s at University of Wisconsin-Madison (PhD ’82), or his stint as a chemistry professor at Georgia Tech (1983-90). Some of these unfamiliar stories and photographs (below: Pat on the streets of Madison ca. 1979-80) were shared by UW classmate and Reed colleague, Prof. Alan Shusterman (PhD ’81) at the annual end-of-year faculty lunch on May 17.

One year ago the Chemistry department found itself in a bind. Our visiting professor of organic chemistry, Luc Boisvert, was scheduled to begin teaching at the University of Puget Sound in the fall, and our regular professor of organic chemistry, Pat McDougal, had just agreed to extend his stay in the Dean of the Faculty office. With a record number of junior chemistry majors (27) and a bumper crop of intro organic students (81) advancing towards our labs, panic seemed like the only reasonable option.

Fortunately, the situation was quickly resolved when Dr. Aaron Nilsen, a research scientist at the Portland VA Research Foundation agreed to take a one-year leave from his research position in order to teach at Reed. Aaron, who grew up in the coastal redwood community of Ben Lomond, California, first learned about Reed as a UC Santa Cruz graduate student in the lab of Rebecca Braslau ’81 and he had been interested in trying his hand at chemistry teaching for some time. Indeed, once on campus, he quickly saw ways in which his research interests could be put to use in Chem 202 and 343, and he soon attracted a large cadre of hardworking research students.

Aaron describes his approach to research this way: “Organic synthesis applied to chemical biology and medicinal chemistry. Students in my research lab work toward translation of structure activity relationships, derived from previously synthesized compounds, literature and high-throughput screens, to the synthesis of biologically active molecules that provide insight into the mechanisms of action of these molecules on their respective parasitic or viral systems.”

But you can just cut to the chase and say: Aaron Nilsen, Microbe Hunter.