As a curious adventurer, I enjoy exploring various branches of knowledge. At the end, all these experiences converge into innocent joy of learning the new. In this logbook, I am leaving the record of my few past adventures.
I was looking at the magnificent pink mixture inside the conical flask: Phenolphthalein was diffusing all her brightness into the battlefield of NaOH & CH3COOH. Appreciating her beauty was nothing but a way to distract myself from utter frustration for my blunder. After a long lab day, I realized I forgot to standardize the Caustic soda solution before titration, and the long datasheet in my hand was no longer valuable.
My journey started from the titration lesson: when my chemistry teacher declared that weak acid - weak base volumetric titration is not performable, it was my skeptical notion that protested instantly. I always find 'impossible' hard to accept. Starting from the finishing line has been my way of adventure.
‘So, why don’t you take a tour inside colorful mixtures?’
It was ridiculous at first: operating research is nothing more than a fantasy for a 10th grader here: you have to fight academically, practically, verbally, and financially at the same time! Impressing a supervisor, convincing the lab authority, paying for chemicals, funding the project by ownself- are just the bits and pieces of the enormous barrier.
‘Yeah, but who wanna lose the Holy Grail chance of being a researcher?’
I had already been ignited by the fantasy of adventure. In effect, I, with my 2 friends, dived into an ocean of uncertainty and risks- without knowing how to swim.
In the meantime, while I was performing random experiments for weeks- just to inspect what really happens in titration, I fell in love with the colors of chemistry. Deep down in my heart, I felt these colors of indicators possessed an invisible potential. Hence, I started to take photographs of titration mixtures. But I was thunderstruck when I realized: color is not a quantitative property.
‘What is the use of 200+ images now? that I captured after months of careful experiments?’
Deep Sigh.
All my hardship was laughing at me. With agony, I considered giving up all my lab work and background study. But colorful solutions had been incorporated with my personality spectrum. Whenever I got stuck in a deadlock situation, bold blue of Bromothymol motivated me to fight back with a greater passion. In the same fashion, deep purple of Bromocresol fueled my vigor- washing away all my exhaustion. Colorful clouds of aspirations did not let me give up.
Taking a leap of faith, I sank into the deep sea of programming with zero concepts on algorithms. Just like a drowning man, I was catching at a straw. As a start, I was mastering every single language and tool related to Data Science... but wait! These weapons would be useless if I could not corporate them into my purpose. What’s more, image processing, with numerous variables and data parameters, seemed to be the most confusing thing I have ever faced: a slight change in the luminosity alters all the pixel values!
Really, transforming colors into numbers was a jinxed task.
Furthermore, the burden of leadership brought me another nightmare. Our lack of experience and supervision unsurprisingly resulted in common errors and failures. Every time any task went wrong, I had to reconstruct the whole plan, combine new concepts from the literature reviews, mark potential barriers, and make a way through them. Convincing teammates with my unique suggestions and keeping their reliance on my leadership was dreadful emotional stress. Guess what? The vibrant orange of Methyl Red was always beside me- keeping me overwhelmed with exciting craze.
Though I could not make weak acid-weak base titration possible, one year of deliberate efforts revealed a unique insight of titration.
However, my adventure from test tubes to keyboard was more than some results. It has turned me into a Jedi knight against the ‘question mark’. Seeking solutions to problems is as essential as breathing to me. In essence, I can fight any challenge now- with powerful colors!
Manuscripts:
[1] 'Developing a System of Indicator Independent Acid-Base Titration'
[2] 'On Methods & Aspects of Developing an Accessible & Reliable Colorimetry Aided Titration'