PUPILS from Hardenhuish School, Chippenham, had the opportunity to analyse chemicals using cutting edge techniques as part of the Royal Society of Chemistry Spectroscopy in a Suitcase programme.

Admittedly, the instruments were large enough to fill several suitcases, however, it was exciting for students to see and use techniques usually used at universities and in industrial research. In particular it was fascinating for Year 13 students and their teachers to use nuclear magnetic resonance to identify very subtly different molecules.

As part of their session held last Tuesday at the school, some Year 10 pupils were also able to use one of the instruments, an infrared spectrometer, in a mock murder investigation. They had to identify which chemical from the selection present was used to ‘kill’ their chemistry teacher, Dr Ovens.

Dr Ovens, lead chemistry teacher at Hardenhuish School, also enjoyed the afternoon, saying: “Many students had their questions answered by the Spectroscopy in a Suitcase team and it was clearly an eye-opening experience for us all.”

Photo 1: Annabel Howe, Rachael Mytton, Rebecca Harborne, Rebecca Lloyd and Matthew Dempsey representing the five chemicals found at the mock murder scene.