{"id":38716,"date":"2025-07-15T16:05:00","date_gmt":"2025-07-15T20:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/?p=38716"},"modified":"2025-07-17T13:07:00","modified_gmt":"2025-07-17T17:07:00","slug":"summer-chemistry-research-fuels-curiosity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/summer-chemistry-research-fuels-curiosity\/","title":{"rendered":"Summer chemistry research fuels curiosity"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alexander Underwood \u201926 came to Furman University craving the chance to learn something new and found it through undergraduate research<\/a>.<\/p>\n

His high school chemistry classes in his home of Fort Mill, South Carolina had left him eager to learn more. \u201cEverything I was taught in my high school classes was something that\u2019s been done already,\u201d Underwood said.<\/p>\n

As a first-year student at Furman, he was looking for opportunities to research topics he\u2019d never even heard of. That opportunity came quickly.<\/p>\n

\"The

Alexander Underwood \u201926, seen here working in a chemistry lab in Plyler Hall, said lab research teaches you firsthand things you don\u2019t find in a typical textbook or classroom setting. Photo by Nathan Gray, Furman University<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cI was in Dr. Gary Guillet\u2019s<\/a> Chemistry 110 class my first year, and he reached out to me with an offer to work in the lab,\u201d Underwood said.<\/p>\n

Underwood was surprised he had the chance to get lab experience in his first year at the university. He\u2019s one of 240 Furman students working as summer research fellows, and one of five students working in the lab with Guillet, associate professor of chemistry.<\/p>\n

Summer research fellows receive discounted summer housing and stipends, from $3,500 to over $5,000, said Erik Ching<\/a>, the Walter Kenneth Mattison Professor of History, interim associate provost for Engaged Learning, and director of Undergraduate Research.<\/p>\n

Underwood has spent two years in Guillet\u2019s lab since first being recruited, and he\u2019s performing reactions he never imagined: synthesizing ligands that help facilitate a unique type of metal bond. It\u2019s a continuation of some of Guillet\u2019s earlier work on iron bonds and gives Underwood the chance to run unique reactions he hasn\u2019t read about in any textbook.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe took a chance on me and really helped guide me from my first year. I don\u2019t know if there\u2019s any other undergraduate institutions that offer that,\u201d Underwood said. \u201cI would have made my college decision in a heartbeat if I had known I\u2019d be doing anything like this.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Guillet, Furman\u2019s strength lies in its faculty. Professors are driven to work with undergraduate students in and outside of the classroom, and they\u2019re equipped with top-quality scientific instruments and lab spaces that many small schools lack. Most people think this level of academic research is reserved for graduate students, \u201cbut Furman students can produce at that level already, so I figure why not set the bar for them and push them there,\u201d Guillet said.<\/p>\n

\"A

Alexander Underwood \u201926 works in a chemistry lab in Plyler Hall while conducting summer research on June 18. Photo by Nathan Gray, Furman University<\/p><\/div>\n

Underwood enjoys a level of independence in the lab, and the students are encouraged to be collaborators, bringing their ideas and input to each reaction they perform. He helps introduce new lab partners to the work and shares his excitement and encouragement with them.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not even doing the research for credit now, I just can\u2019t see myself not doing this research next year,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s working on a research paper and had the chance to present his work at the 2024 Southeastern Regional Meeting of the American Chemical Society<\/a>. He also gave a presentation during Furman Engaged<\/a>, the university\u2019s annual celebration of students\u2019 diverse engaged learning experiences. He\u2019s looking forward to publishing the paper he\u2019s drafting for his senior thesis and hopes other researchers will build off the work he\u2019s done at Furman.<\/p>\n

The classroom isn\u2019t the only place students learn lifelong lessons, Guillet said, and the lab is a place where Underwood and others hone their \u201cfocus, perseverance and the \u2018need to know\u2019 sensation that research engenders, and that researchers must have.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Alexander Underwood \u201926 has been doing lab research with Professor Gary Guillet since his first year at Furman University, and is one of 240 Furman students working as summer research fellows.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":401,"featured_media":38602,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[53,2711,55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38716","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chemistry","category-engaged-learning","category-undergraduate-research"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/401"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38716"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38716\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38736,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38716\/revisions\/38736"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}