MacVicar Day celebrates the chemistry of collaboration
Where there’s chemistry, there’s often energy, usually in the form of heat lost or gained. Anyone who has ever used an instant ice or heat pack to relieve aching muscles has experienced this relationship between chemistry and energy: When one of these packs is bent in half, chemicals from separate compartments mix together, activating a spontaneous thermodynamic reaction that either releases heat or draws it in, depending on whether the pack is meant to be hot or cold. This simple example of free energy was a favorite of the late Robert Silbey, a chemistry professor and MIT’s former dean of science, who used the therapeutic packs to great effect in his undergraduate thermodynamics class for years. Silbey, who passed away last October, was honored last Friday at MacVicar Day, an annual event held to celebrate the current MacVicar Fellows....