Haven't we met before?

My forays into random areas of chemical research have a way of coming back to me several years after that first exposure. My undergraduate research focused on a very reactive species called a carbene. I ended up doing a seminar on the use of stable carbenes as catalysts in organic reactions in graduate school (I was onto something, using carbene catalysts is a very active area of research). I took a thermodynamics class before I started graduate school full time. I had to write a paper and make a presentation on the thermodynamic aspects of an active area of research. Chiral chromatography was the closest thing to what I was working on at the time that had some thermo equations in the research papers.

Nine years later, I am looking into using chiral chromatography to delve a little deeper into an interesting observation that I stumbled on while investigating a much different problem a year or so ago. I have no idea if the experiment I have in mind will actually yield any new or interesting information, but the question that I am looking to answer is interesting enough that I think it's worth trying. (Finding interesting questions like this is what makes my job worthwhile. I would get bored very quickly without them.) I mentioned it to a couple of people at work today. While we agree that there is a good chance I won't find anything unexpected, there is a good chance that we could be wrong. As long as the column I want isn't too expensive, I will likely do a few experiments to see what happens.

This kind of experience is a reminder that you never know when some stray bit of information that you pick up in a random article or book will be useful. If I hadn't written a paper about chiral chromatography for my thermo class, I would not have come up with this new experiment. Reading whatever catches your eye at any given time is just a good a way to select reading material as planning out a reading list several books at a time. There are so many things out there about being passionate about your work. You might as well be passionate about what you're reading too.