Patricio Santander
Senior Lecturer
I teach two sections of sophomore Organic Chemistry (CHEM 227 or CHEM 228, one section of Organic Synthesis and Analysis IV (CHEM 234) for Chemistry majors and I supervise some sections of Organic Chemistry Labs for non-majors (CHEM 237 or CHEM 238) each Fall or Spring semesters.
I enjoy all different parts of the teaching experience, in particular the "Office Hours" interactions with the students which gives me a better opportunity to relate the subjects we discuss on the whiteboard with their career interests, and possibly get them in contact with research labs.
In the early 1980's, when I came to Texas A&M for my graduate studies, I got involved in different aspects of the Vitamin B12 biosynthetic studies project in Professor A. Ian Scott's laboratories. I was fortunate to work in a rather unique project that gave me the opportunity to use several different techniques (synthesis of stable-isotopically labeled starting materials, enzyme purification, cloning, microbiology and high field NMR analysis) and learn from expert senior colleagues in these areas. The race for unraveling the nature of the two biosynthetic pathways of this complex molecule has been exciting and plenty of surprises.