Harvey Blanck's Home Page

IChemistry Department Homepage    
e-mail:  blanckh@apsu.edu

 In 1994 I retired from full time teaching, but worked half time in the Chemistry Department as Instrument Lab Manager and taught an evening section of General Chemistry.  In 1997 I worked just part time as a Research Chemist doing molecular modeling with several undergraduate chemistry majors.  When the new science building was completed in 2000, I ceased all teaching activities at APSU. Currently I am particularly interested in three areas pertaining to physical chemistry.

(1) El Nino: 1997 was the year of one of the largest El Nino events ever recorded. Both NASA and NOAA collected data concerning that El Nino. NASA's TOPEX satellite radar altimetry data is used to generate graphics of El Nino in the Pacific Ocean. After looking at NASA's data, it became apparent that the total amount of excess thermal energy in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean could be determined. If you are interested in how radar altimetry information may be used in chemistry courses, you may wish to read the paper I published in the Journal of Chemical Education. (Here is the JCE article). For the TOPEX data and picture used in the JCE paper go to my TOPEX webpage (Go to 'TOPEX' in the website page listing menu column in the left margin.) If you wish to learn more about El Nino, you may wish to visit NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory's TOPEX project Web site at http://topex-www.jpl.nasa.gov/ and NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory's (PMEL) ATLAS buoy data Web site at http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/toga-tao/realtime.html.

(2) Energy conservation: I have put together a few comments concerning this topic in my Energy Cost and Conservation page. (Look at 'Energy Conservation' in the website page listing menu column in the left margin.)

(3) Diffusion and Gravity Current Models and Speadsheets:  See my diffusion model page for construction of plastic models. (See the 'Diffusion Model' in the website page listing menu in the left margin.)

For additional information concerning my professional activities, please refer to my Professional Information webpage. (Visit the 'Professional Information' in the website page listing menu column in the left margin.)