Voices

Before I go back to the adventures with tetrahedrane, I thought I would take a short break to talk about group theory. I started learning group theory seriously some time back, as a part of chemistry course. Till now I had seen notations like \(D_{h}\)and \(T_{d}\) and had secretly wondered what they were with a vague feeling that they somehow represented what the molecule looked like. My footing in rigorous math is at best questionable, so pardon me wherever I might not be that precise. Groups are an abstract collections of things/objects (as it might be evident from the name) with a particular operations defines between elements (like addition or multiplication) that obey particular properties. The most obvious and oldest of groups are things known as rotation groups. They are what they sound like: groups which are collection of all the rotations you can do. For example Euler's theorem says that any rotations of an object be it a chair or a planet where a point in the body r...

I came across this very interesting hydrocarbon a couple of weeks back. It's called a platonic hydrocarbon; not the platonic of platonic relationships that of platonic solids of the diamond and methane fame :).  A platonic solid is quite symmetric like a cube,;the loose definition being that the number or faces intersecting at each vertex is the same and each face has the same shape and proportions like square faces of a cube. Time for the first look ! Looks very simple doesn't it ? Now you would be wondering if you have seen this somewhere ? If someone had told you that x or y was made with tetrahedrane and in a weak moment you forgot ? Don't worry ;) No one has seen this because it hasn't been made yet. Yes, this simple molecule has been eluding people in lab coats and goggles for quite some time. The reasons for this are quite interesting. The simple answer is that the molecule has angle strain, and while you're at it, truckloads and truckloads of i...

Yes you heard it right !, I'm back, finally ! I had a vision sneak upon me, like how it did on Peter Parker in Amazing Spider man 2. He's sitting at home, looking at photos of Mary, reminiscing, sullen and definitely not spider man. He comes across a video of her speaking about the future and he realizes that the world is still out there. Despite her not being a part of it, its still beautiful, and it still needs spider man. I had a similar epiphany today. I realized that despite what happened, despite how broken I feel, there is tomorrow. There are places waiting to be explored, theorems and molecules waiting to be discovered and stories waiting to be told. I might not be the same person who I was, but I hope this time I become something more, someone more deep and passionate. I want to wake up each day and jump out of my bed; literally ! :D