Chester to Get Greener with Chemist

Raksmey Derival, a chemist from Beyond Benign will visit Chester College of New England on Tuesday, October 7. She will speak about the "Green Chemistry" movement at 10:30 a.m. and then give a lab presentation to students at 2:30 p.m. Both events will take place in the Dalrymple Center and the morning session is open to the public.

Beyond Benign is a nonprofit focused on creating a workforce and public that is well educated in green chemistry in order to create safer materials for a thriving society. Derival received her B.S. degree in biochemistry from Suffolk University where she gained experience in green chemistry outreach program development. She was awarded a National Science Foundation fellowship to perform bio-organic chemistry research at the Ohio State University, and worked as an analytical chemist and forensic toxicologist at a drug testing lab in Massachusetts for three years. She spent a year working with Dr. John Warner and Dr. Amy Cannon at the Center for Green Chemistry at the University of Massachusetts Lowell before joining Beyond Benign as a K-12 and Community Outreach Program Manager.