Chemistry Stories interviewed Arko Aalok Sarkar this week as part of our Elements of Success series, which profiles undergraduates studying in the department.
Bio: Hi! My name is Arko Aalok Sarkar (he/him), and I'm an international student whose lived in Singapore and Kolkata before beginning my undergrad here in Toronto. I'm part of Victoria College, and I'm in my fourth and final year of the Chemistry Specialist program at the St. George campus. Outside of the lab I enjoy watching anime, reading manga, playing FPS games with my friends, listening to music (Porter Robinson, math rock, j-rock), and when I have more free time, playing the piano.
You spent two months at Imperial College London last year participating in research. How did that come together? What can you tell us about the experience?
This summer, I had the opportunity to take part in a research exchange program with Imperial College London in the Brandt-Talbot research group, where I was involved in structural elucidation of ionoSolv extracted poplar lignin using 2D NMR experiments. The opportunity was highlighted by the Chemistry department, but I had already been planning to apply for the SREP since I had actually taken part in the SREP program the year prior at the University of Liverpool. I applied to the program, listing potential supervisors, research themes and research topics, focusing on analytical chemistry and green chemistry, and was eventually nominated to participate.
At this point I ranked my potential supervisor choices and was assigned to the Brandt-Talbot group. The experience was a great opportunity to work with researchers from another institution and allowed me to experience working in another research group culture. Though it was a very short timeframe for a research project, it was a valuable experience in dealing with roadblocks in the research process, such as limited time and sample to work with.
How did you first become interested in studying chemistry?
I have always been interested in the natural sciences since I was a kid, particularly biology and chemistry. I became specifically focused on chemistry in my last two years of high school when quantum mechanics were introduced to along with orbitals as a way to explain some of the underlying principles behind bonding and the geometries of compounds. The shift from a collection of rules and exceptions to a coherent system connecting bizarre microscopic behavior to tangible, visible reality is what solidified my interest in chemistry.
Can you remember a time when a fact about chemistry blew your mind? (Put another way—what is your favorite fact about chemistry?
My favorite fact about chemistry is that, electrons though they have an intrinsic angular momentum confusingly named spin, are not actually spinning. If the electron were to be actually spinning, its would be rotating faster than the speed of light! This spin makes chemistry possible, and leads to many of the unique behaviors we can observe such as magnetism, transition metal complex geometries, and colored compounds.
What advice would you give new U of T undergraduates considering a chemistry specialty?
Chemistry is a super broad field which has interdisciplinary ties to almost every other field of study. Keep that in mind when you choose any of the specialist programs offered by the department as very often, it is possible to change your programs to fit your interests even as an upper year student. That is to say, you should not feel the need to limit yourself to a specific branch of chemistry early on, given this opportunity to explore the full breadth of chemistry at UofT. Also, the option to specialize further is always open to you.
Is there anything else you'd like to share about your journey as a scholar and student?
My journey as a student interested in science started all the way back in kindergarten when I was in Singapore. Encyclopedias and National Geographic magazines were what I loved spending time reading. This continued all the way through elementary and middle school where I also took part in science and math olympiads. In 7th grade our family moved to India where I attended high school in Kolkata. Here, I started engaging more with the research process, by planning and conducting a group project and writing my own research paper through a mentorship program. Then, in 2022 I was accepted here at UofT, and arrived after a stressful period of visa issues. The past few years of getting to immerse myself in learning have been extremely fulfilling, but like for many international students, the homesickness and distance from the people I grew up with still gets to me sometimes. Throughout all of this, the most important part of my experience as a student has been amazing teachers, professors and the people around me who helped nurture the genuine love for learning that I carry with me.
Have you participated in a Chemistry Department poster session or presented at a conference? What was your topic?
Not at a Chemistry Department session or conference, but I have presented a poster about my NMR reference database project at University of Liverpool to supervisors and fellow exchange students at the conclusion of that SREP. The poster detailed the process of building a robust NMR reference database for the purpose of metabolomics.