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Dear VIPEr Colleagues,
Happy New Year! I am working on a new idea for a classroom activity entitled, "The Chemistry of Shoes." I absolutely love shoes and I thought I could create something useful to post on VIPEr. For instance, dress shoes are often made of leather and the process of tanning makes the leather more waterproof. Chromium(III) salts are often used as tanning agents, which I didn't know. Apparently, there is cross-linkage of chromium ions with the free carboxyl groups in collagen. So, there is some interesting chemistry we could discuss in the classroom. Now, another interesting discussion that could be included here is the environmental impact of using chromium salts in the tanning industry. Any thoughts? Has anyone discussed this topic in class? Applications of inorganic compounds are always neat to discuss in the classroom.
I think that's a great idea! I hadn't even thought of the inorganic chemistry of shoes. Definitely let us know what you find out and how the classroom activity comes together.
Will do!
SNC
I haven't talked about leather tanning in class, but I vaguely remember a recent C&E News article about the environmental/human impacts. I just tried to search for it without any luck, but I did come up with a number of interesting articles that talk about more benign alternatives to chromium and the history of leather.
Lots of interesting possibilities!
I've been pondering this since Sibrina posted it, looking around at people's shoes and thinking about what other chemistry is there. Do you think maybe there's a whole (non-majors?) course under here? I wonder if this could be expanded to "Chemistry of Fashion." I'm envisioning something about textiles, synthetics/polymers, hydrophobic vs. hydrophilic interactions, dyes, etc.