Blog CSD Educators

For this CSD Educators blog, I have the pleasure to introduce to you Prof. Alessia Bacchi, from the University of Parma in Italy. In this blog, Alessia will talk to us about her recent experience teaching "virtually" the use of Mercury and the CSD in high schools, with the goal to help students and teachers with the learning and teaching of three-dimensional concepts, such as the geometry of molecules.

It is my pleasure to welcome Dr Natalia Alvarez as our guest for this CSD Educators blog. This is actually a welcome back, as Natalia was a guest editor for the CCDC in 2016, talking about the OpenLab in Uruguay. In this blog instead, Natalia will talk to us about her journey in crystallography, how she first met the CSD (spoiler: it was not love at first sight!), her contribution in regional crystallography schools with insights on how to teach the use of crystallographic databases, in particular the CSD.

It is my pleasure to welcome Professor Dean Johnston from Otterbein University for our next entry in the CSD Educator series. Dean is an avid user and champion of the CSD, from his experience as a graduate student growing crystals to integrating the CSD in his lectures in inorganic chemistry. Dean developed the Symmetry@Otterbein online resource to showcase structures with interesting symmetry; a resource that has since been included in the Database of Crystallographic Online Resources (DECOR). In 2016, scientists from the CCDC facilitated a workshop at Otterbein University where Dean had free access to his school’s 3D printer which provided an opportunity for every attendee to design and print out a 3D model.

For this CSD Educators blog it is my pleasure to welcome Dr Samuel Tetteh from the University of Cape Coast, Ghana. Samuel holds a PhD in Chemistry from the University of Cape Coast and is now a teacher and researcher at the University. I first met Samuel at a workshop in Kumasi in Ghana in 2016 and it has been fantastic to see how Samuel has gone on to use the Cambridge Structural Database to provide a more visual and engaging way to teach structural chemistry to his students. Samuel also employs the CSD in his research involving the study of structural and bonding properties of transition metal complexes and has published a number of research papers in this area. In this blog Samuel will tell us more about his teaching experiences and how crystal structures have helped him revolutionalise how he teaches chemistry. Samuel will also be speaking at our Educators UGM in March so if you want to find out more or have any questions for Samuel then you can register here.

For this CSD Educators blog it is my pleasure to welcome Marielle Agbahoungbata and to highlight the work she has done with her colleagues to help establish the X-TechLab in Benin. Marielle gained her PhD in inorganic chemistry and since 2014 has been involved in developing a network of crystallographers in Africa. Marielle is the coordinator of the X-TechLab in Benin which aims to provide hands-on training in X-ray techniques in order to provide African scientists with the means to develop solutions for the sustainable development of the continent. The first training session that X-TechLab team organised was held in May 2019 and I was lucky enough to join the second session in Benin in November 2019. That session saw a classroom full of participants from Benin and across Africa learn about X-ray diffraction. During the sessions on the Cambridge Structural Database the students were engaged and eager to learn and I felt privileged to be a part of it.  A few months ago, the CCDC participated in our second X-TechLab training sessions, this time remotely. Again, it was fantastic to see how engaged the students were. In this blog Marielle will tell us more about the X-TechLab and how the team is striving to disseminate science and bridge scientific and entrepreneurship communities through the initiative.

For this CSD Educators blog we wanted to share with you our experience hosting our first CCDC Virtual Workshops. The CCDC Virtual Workshops are interactive live sessions aimed at training our community remotely in using the CSD Software, and we launched the first series of three 90-minutes sessions in November 2020. We wanted to deliver a proper workshop, where you had the chance to try exercises yourself, ask us your questions, discuss together the issues you encounter and interact with us. After much thinking, planning and experimenting, we brought to you the CCDC Virtual Workshops.

In this blog you will read more about the format, the numbers, and what we have learnt from this experience.

It is my pleasure to welcome Professor Michael Zdilla from Temple University as our guest for the third blog of the CSD Educators series. In his journey through crystallography teaching, Mike has created the Database for Educational Crystallographic Online Resources (DECOR), which we now host here at the CCDC. In its creator’s words, “DECOR is the world’s first online repository of shared teaching materials for crystallographic education. The site has an array of downloadable visual aids, animations, homework problems, and links to online courses and software downloads. DECOR is a resource for anyone in search of teaching tools for development of a new course for crystallography, augmentation of existing courses, or the pursuit of an informal education in crystallography and diffraction.”

This is the second blog in our CSD Educators series and I am delighted to introduce Chiara Massera from the University of Parma. In our CSD Educators series we will be hearing from lecturers and teachers about some of their experiences in education and their journey to using the Cambridge Structural Database (CSD).  Chiara is a passionate educator with twenty years experience teaching students. She has helped to organise several international crystallography schools including last years “Crystallographic Information Fiesta” in Naples. We asked Chiara to tell us more about her journey to teaching others about the wonders of crystallography.  

This is the first blog in our CSD Educators series and I am delighted to introduce Greg Ferrence - @FerrenceG - from Illinois State University. In our CSD Educators series we will be hearing from lecturers and teachers about some of their experiences in education and their journey to using the Cambridge Structural Database (CSD).  We wanted Greg to launch this series because not only has he used the CSD at his institution, but he has helped the CCDC shape our own educational resources and if that wasn’t enough he is currently doing a virtual sabbatical with us. We asked Greg to tell us about how he has used structural data to help inspire a new generation of scientists, his long standing collaboration with the CCDC and his journey to having a guest editor slot on our popular #FeaturedStructureFriday social media campaign.