The Rare Earth Elements Project

Q&A with The Rare Earth Elements Project

How would you describe the nature of the team in a single sentence?
Please describe as feels most comfortable to you.

For example, ‘a team from X working with collaborators from Y and Z’, ‘a collaboration between X, Y and Z’, etc.
The Rare Earth Elements Project is an interdisciplinary team of chemistry, history, and fine art collaborators. Their aim is to educate students and the science-curious public about critical metals and the impacts of current production methods.

What would be your advice to educators who are working with colleagues going above and beyond, but are yet to nominate them for an RSC Education prize?
It’s great to have a chance to share your work with a wider community of people engaged with science education.

Please list any trade publications (magazines, websites, etc.
) that you are aware of that are particularly relevant to your area of research. This will help us better target our press activity.AHA Perspectives on History (https://www.historians.org/perspectives)History of Science Society Newsletter (https://hssonline.org/blogpost/1987463/Newsletter )Society for History of Technology Newsletter (https://www.historyoftechnology.org/publications/shot-newsletter/ )Newsletter, Division for History of Chemistry, ACS: http://acshist.scs.illinois.edu/newslett/index.php

What was your role within the team?
Shelley Wilks Geehr - I was the project director, assigning and overseeing the work of Science History Institute staff and external vendors. I was fortunate to have such a talented and creative group of people at every phase of the work.

Eric Schelter - As the PI for the Center for Sustainable Separations of Metals and a rare earth metals chemist, I was a subject matter expert and participated as a panelist in the video recordings and consultant for the development of the digital exhibit.

Roger Turner - I was the historian.
I worked with scientists to create a digital museum exhibit that connects the history of critical metals to contemporary research questions. I also worked with educators to create a role-playing curriculum and wrote articles for news sites and magazines.

Anna Mlasowsky - As an artist mainly working in glass, my role was to conduct artistic research between 2021 and 2022 in the Science History Institute’s (SHIs) archive and collection, as a Haas short-term Fellow to study the history and socio-ecologic impact of Rare Earth mining on communities.
My research was particularly centered around the elements we use in glass production, as my artistic work is directly impacted by the global material market and economies. As a research artist in residence, I was also co-hosted at the glass department of the Tyler School of Art, where I shared my work with the students.

Christy Schneider - As a project manager and exhibition developer, I supported artist Anna Mlasowsky in accessing internal and external resources to inform her research and studio work.
Key resources included materials from our object and library/archival collection and introductions to staff, especially Roger Turner, who had collected rare earth materials and developed educational assets. I also introduced Roger and Anna to local Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) staff who led us on a tour of the Gloucester, New Jersey Welsbach rare earths Superfund Site. I enjoy managing projects that connect objects and people with related sites, so we can incorporate various sources and perspectives into our exhibitions and programming.

Marta Guron - I was helping Roger (the historian and curator) by finding useful scientific resources, and by contributing to the brainstorming session to put together a comprehensive and enticing story about the usefulness of critical metals.

Leighton Jones: Although a researcher, I undertook a more science consulting role for this project.

What were the biggest challenges in this project?
Eric Schelter - Probably trying to gauge what aspects of the chemistry and physics of rare earths would be most appealing to the general public and coming up with accessible ways to talk about them.

Roger Turner - Our biggest challenge was that layoffs of staff amidst the pandemic suddenly removed people with key skills and experience.
Teammates lost their jobs. It also reduced the kinds of outreach and education work we could do.

Anna Mlasowsky - Into a scientific environment as an artist naturally brings challenges.
Artistic research can be less focused and more searching, so I asked quite a bit of SHI to accommodate my work and break up my visits and give me extra support to figure out how to conduct research at a science archive. It was surely challenging for me to not be too intimidated by scientific books and to find material I could both understand and use for what I was doing.

Marta Guron - The biggest challenge was to find the resources that could be necessary in making this exhibition amidst the pandemic.
We worked back and forth within a group of people coming from diverse backgrounds to make this work possible.

Shelley Wilks Geehr - On a micro level, translating the ideas of the donor into executable projects with defined outcomes for the project team.
On a macro level, balancing the messaging between the benefits of rare earth elements and the environmental damage rare earth element mining can inflict. It was important that both the good and the bad be represented.

Leighton Jones: Learning the deep history and telling the story.

What different strengths did different people bring to the team?
Eric Schelter - This team was remarkable, intellectually and creatively diverse, from scientists and science managers to historians and an artist. But they always had a willingness to listen and learn from each other.

Roger Turner - This project really brought together people with different expertise, but a shared commitment to education and engagement.
It was great to have an engineer and chemists able to explain the science in accessible ways, a cultural geographer with a keen sense of the spatial politics of rare earth production, and educators skilled in translating for students. And it was a treat to work with artists to communicate all this in really compelling ways. The Science History Institute is unusual in having experienced journalists and skilled science communicators working with historians and museum professionals on history of science projects.

Ranadeb Ball - Roger, Eric and Marta were the masterminds behind this project.
Roger planned the initial model, that we followed and provided our feedback. His experience in science history and Google exhibitions was crucial for this work. Leighton and I contributed to the scientific brainstorming sessions and provided research articles and commentaries that could be helpful for this project.

Anna Mlasowsky - It was great working with Christy Schneider, Senior Manager of Exhibition Projects and Programming.
Christy was a go-to person for the project and facilitated my work in tandem with the other staff. She also managed the educational exhibition I had at SHI as the conclusion of my fellowship. Another person I was frequently in contact with was Roger Turner, Curator of Instruments and Artifacts, as his research related directly to my work. Roger and Christy also helped me to communicate with the Environmental Protection Agency and arrange a visit to the old Welsbach factory Superfund Site in Camden NJ, which would have never been possible for me as an individual. The institutional support was a key element in this project.

What inspires or motivates your team?
Roger Turner - An interest in discovering the stories behind the science, to help people see the people who make science and the effects of science on our world.

Leighton Jones: The desire to discover knowledge and then disseminate that to a wide audience for public benefit.

Why is this work so important and exciting?
Eric Schelter - The energy transition (shift to renewables) will touch all aspects of human life. It's great to help uncover and help others understand the many facets of this shift, namely as they pertain to obtaining energy-critical materials.

Ranadeb Ball - Critical metals of this decade are the lanthanides and actinides, which are essential for modern technologies such as electronics, internet, and telecommunication.
While this work documents the importance of these precious elements from the periodic table to bring awareness to the general public, the exhibition attempts to be cohesive and interactive at the same time.

Shelley Wilks Geehr - I love a project that can reach multiple audiences in multiple ways.
The history, impact, and potential of rare earth elements can and should be known to students, citizens, and community leaders. We were fortunate to be able to share our knowledge in person, on social media, and in digital form with a range of audiences.

Christy Schneider - Connecting historians, artists, and environmental scientists, and developing materials that interpret and present their work for public audiences, offers a multidisciplinary view into the impact of science on society.
Rare earths are ubiquitous to the smartphone in my pocket and to the colors in glass; the multiple aspects of this project allow us to think across the applications of these elements and consider the ecological and human implications of our reliance on them. The Mountain Pass sculpture is part of a larger series Mlasowsky is making of vessels depicting mines in Bayan Obo, China and Pittinga, Brazil. While secretaries of commerce and CEOs might emphasize difference to dominate a market, Mlasowsky’s work functions as a homage to the similarities among these sites of extraction.

Leighton Jones: It conveys the history and knowledge of rare earth elements and critical metals in a digital format.
Such elements are key for modern technology, so learning about them and keeping up to date with what makes everything tick is fundamental to the modern age.

Where do you see the biggest impact of this project being?
Eric Schelter - Getting students, and folks generally, interested in these weird, wonderful rare earths!

Anna Mlasowsky - My portion of this project is directly tied to the glass art community and the field of craft.
This project creates awareness and shows how I as a craft practitioner can critically examine the materials I use and how they are linked to climate change, outsourced pollution, outsourced colonialism, and environmental destruction. Art can serve as a case study to explain complex and often difficult-to-understand concepts of economy, globalism, and politics.

Christy Schneider - Science History Institute is considering how to implement an artist-in-residence program on an annual basis to encourage artists to use our collection and be in dialogue with our audiences through exhibitions and public programming.

Leighton Jones: The wider public learning the key elements to electronic devices, why they are critical and the awareness gained from socioeconomic factors that play into both the history and modern usage of these

How do you see this work developing over the next few years, and what is next for this initiative/project?
Anna Mlasowsky - At the conclusion of my fellowship, SHI hosted a one-day conference Titled “Color, Metals, and Environments”, which brought together a number of researchers around the same topic. This conference created the foundation for a larger article that will be published in the peer-reviewed, interdisciplinary journal, Media+Environment. Although my fellowship at SHI is completed, the project I have been creating there is still waiting to be exhibited, and glass pieces created during this time in response to the work done at SHI, while at Tyler School of Art, are waiting to be finished. Until the exhibition isn’t open and the work not completed, the project is not finished for me. I look forward to getting the opportunity to complete this project in the future.

Leighton Jones: More online exhibitions illustrating how critical elements affect our modern lives with specific examples.

What are the qualities that make your team special?
Roger Turner - An interest in working across disciplines and across ways of knowing how to make important information accessible to a wide range of learners.

Leighton Jones: We come from all backgrounds with varying degrees of expertise that overlap at the interface of critical elements.

What advice would you give to a young person considering a career in chemistry?
Ranadeb Ball - Chemistry gives you ways to look at the natural world with a molecular perspective that is interesting on its own. How light talks to molecules and molecules talks to their neighbors are interesting areas of chemical studies that lead to a myriad of applications. This interesting quality of chemistry to connect the physical molecular realm into hardcore applications is quite unique and inspiring.

Eric Schelter - Work on cultivating a sense for discovering important but under-appreciated chemical problems.

Leighton Jones: The two major applications of chemistry are medicine and material technology.
These are widely funded and are always driving innovation that have a direct impact on our lives, from new drug to new smart phones. Take a broad look at these two vast areas and consider if you want to be in either of these. Chemistry at its heart is all about atoms, molecules and electrons - which make up the world - so a career in chemistry will help you have a more profound understanding of how things work.

How can this project benefit the wider education community?
Gwendolyn Bailey - This project benefits the wider education community in the sense that doing the science is just as important as communicating the science. The wider education community can also learn more about communication and dissemination techniques. The abstruse knowledge, technical vocabulary and expert chemistry that the rare earth scientists produce are not digestible to mass audiences. Staying behind walls of complex molecular formulas, and writing journal articles and books that few will read will do nothing to spread real world influence. The work of a rare earth scientist is not to just fiddle with a microscope - but to make the public engaged in the "balance problem" of the rare earths and the alarming lack of resource independence for the energy transition. Fortunately, I had the opportunity to participate in several events - such as those facilitated with the Science History Institute which allowed me to do exactly that.

Ranadeb Ball - Light and electronics are two important technologies that enthralls everyone.
Getting an immersive experience into the chemistry of light and rare earth in general may inspire young enthusiasts to pursue a career in this field. Further, understanding where these elements come from and how geopolitics take part in this scientific venture may provide wider perspective.

Shelley Wilks Geehr - The Case of Rare Earth Elements allows students who may not think they are good at science to bring their strengths in research, persuasion, analysis, and even performance to the science classroom and understand that it takes all kinds of skills and talents to contribute to the scientific enterprise.

Leighton Jones: They can see how this has made an impact and will hopefully inspire them to do similar projects themselves - boosting their own audiences and making content available across more platforms.

What is the importance of collaboration in the chemical sciences?
Eric Schelter - The most significant and impactful work in modern chemistry is driven by teams whose members come from wildly different backgrounds.

Leighton Jones: In the past, single-person success meant greatness, but its become increasingly clear in the modern day that to make further progress a significant amount of data, analysis and time is required to sort and study the vast universe of chemical combinations and properties.
No one can reasonably take on big challenges by themselves or have all the right skills, access to instruments, codes or background knowledge to undertake important studies today.

How can good science education support solving global challenges?
Shelley Wilks Geehr - By helping students see that they can change things. It is important that science is not presented as finished or finalized fact. More research and more experimentation lead to new knowledge and new solutions.

Leighton Jones: With the rise of misinformation and attempts to sway the public opinion away from experts, it's become increasingly important to have a good education, particularly one which has a thorough grounding in science.
This has become increasingly apparent win the COVID pandemic with many seemingly healthy people rejecting the vaccine based on misconceptions, only to suffer as a consequence.

How are the chemical sciences making the world a better place?
Eric Schelter - By working towards supporting a high standard of living while maintaining a sustainable civilization.

Ranadeb Ball - Chemical science is solving some of the pressing questions of the 21st century, from solving the global energy crisis with sustainable and green energy alternatives to curing severe health issues with medicinal chemistry and chemical biology.
These efforts will soon become crucial for our ability to achieve long-term sustainability.

Leighton Jones: Knowledge is power, so it is said.
And the only way to fight misinformation about diseases and climate change is to have a better understanding of the science that is involved. The act of chemical scientists is to research potential solutions to the many challenges we face today.

Why is chemistry important?
Leighton Jones: Chemistry is everything, and everywhere. Everything we touch, see taste and smell involves molecules, such as DNA, proteins, oxygen, enzymes and more. Even our thoughts are processes of neurotransmitters (molecules) that are passed between neuron cells. Every keyboard letter, every screen tap and swipe, every internet page or game is a result of electrons passing through complex high-powered circuitry. That circuitry is made of many different components with many different functions. Those components are themselves manufactured with both silicon and critical elements. Our entire life and modern world is based on chemical structures, their properties and how they are used to generate a response on a level that we can see with our eyes. There is no better way to understand the universe than understanding chemistry.