Five-year research journey at McMaster turns all-star grad student into a colleague and co-founder

On the eve of Convocation, Kay McCallum is happy to be interviewed once again but has just one request.

This can’t be a story about their contributions to equity, diversity and inclusion committees, the annual Meet the Groups event run the Department of Chemistry & Chemical Biology, the Science Graduate Students Association, SciCommBites or the Susan Cunningham Science Leadership Academy.

Those stories have already been written. What’s yet to be told is McCallum’s graduate research – the five years they’ve spent at McMaster applying atmospheric chemistry techniques to the world of art conservation science.

“Doing that research is the whole reason why I came to Mac. I don’t want to leave anyone with the impression that I was never in the lab.”

So here’s the overdue story about McCallum’s research journey.

The journey began at home. McCallum’s parents were the first in their families to go to university and they wanted the tradition to continue with their three children. They taught McCallum, their sister and brother how to think critically and introduced them at an early age to art, culture, history and science.

“My parents always supported my interests, no matter what direction they ran.”

In 2013, one of those directions led McCallum to Macaulay Honors College at Brooklyn College – a small liberal arts college within a comprehensive research university. They earned both a bachelor of science degree in chemistry and an honours bachelor of arts in history. “I was a liberal arts student who became a scientist.”

Four years later, McCallum returned to Edmonton, began working as a lab tech and department supervisor at a testing, inspection and certification services company, and applied to grad school at the University of Alberta.

Their application caught the attention of associate professor Sarah Styler. The environmental chemist was looking to launch an art conservation project within her P.A.R.T.I.C.L.E.S research group, inspired by their year-long stint as a conservation science intern at Tate Britain.

Styler was sifting through grad school applications, hoping to find a student with an interdisciplinary background plus a passion for art and science. “I knew I couldn’t pull a bait and switch with a traditional chemistry student,” says Styler.

She knew right away that McCallum was the ideal candidate. “Kay checked every box.”

She reached out to McCallum with an invitation to join her research group. McCallum was an enthusiastic yes. “I was already interested in environmental chemistry and Dr. Styler had a reputation as a brilliant scientist and supportive supervisor. This was such a unique opportunity –  I couldn’t pass it up.”  They joined Styler’s research group in September 2019, not knowing how much would change in less than a year.

Working with Styler was so rewarding that McCallum followed their supervisor to McMaster during a global pandemic. Styler had accepted an offer to join Mac’s Department of Chemistry & Chemical Biology in July 2020. She invited everyone in her research group to join her in making the move east.  McCallum and four other grad students started packing.

“Not only did my parents encourage me to take the leap and move to Hamilton, my dad helped drive the U-Haul van across Canada during the COVID lockdown. It was actually a great road trip. I’d like to do that trip again with my dad with a less unwieldy vehicle.”

McCallum and their four group-mates agreed to become roommates. They wound up staying in the same student rental for the rest of their time at Mac, becoming lifelong friends.

Once settled at Mac, McCallum dove into their research. They applied atmospheric chemistry techniques to art conservation science, advancing our understanding of how cultural heritage objects like paintings and sculptures degrade over time.

These objects are chemically complex and reactive with the environment, says McCallum. Analytical and atmospheric chemists like McCallum can help conservation scientists keep irreplaceable cultural heritage objects in pristine condition over decades and centuries.

It’s a complex field and one where McCallum got to collaborate with leading researchers from around the world. Together, they applied high-end analytical instrumentation to study how indoor air quality affects art in museums.

It proved to be fascinating and far-reaching research. McCallum studied how different historic pigments affect how acrylic paint components degrade when exposed to light. They also identified what fumes are released from construction materials found in museums (think of everything that’s used to build new exhibit spaces) and how those fumes might change based on testing conditions, the museum’s age and climate.

“Humans spend 90 per cent of our time indoors so it’s important to understand indoor air quality and all of the contributing factors. It’s especially important when it comes to cultural heritage objects that are often far more sensitive to pollutants than we are.” McCallum’s research can help show museums not only how best to conserve their collections but when it’s safe to fill and open new exhibition spaces. Open those spaces too soon and the art could be irreparably damaged – open too late and the museum could lose much needed ticket sales. Right now, there’s no easy or reliable way to take those measurements.

McCallum also discovered that their research was a novel way to introduce chemistry to non-chemists. McCallum created and taught a “Chemistry in the Art Gallery” module that was added to INSPIRE 1A03 – a first-year course open to all students at McMaster. “I got to introduce students to the idea that you can go to a museum and think of the art as both aesthetic and chemically reactive objects.” McCallum’s paper – “Chemistry in the Art Gallery – Student-Teacher Perspectives on Developing and Delivering an Experiential Course Module at McMaster University” – was published in the Journal of Chemical Education last August.

After successfully defending their PhD, McCallum called their mother who works as a family practice doctor back in Edmonton.  “My mum was one of the first people to call me Dr. McCallum. That was one of the most meaningful moments of my life – a culmination of a lot of different things. I couldn’t have done any of this without my parents.”

Their parents will be at Convocation, along with McCallum’s roommates. The two PhD students who graduated in June are coming back to watch their three friends walk across the stage and cheer on McCallum as they deliver the valedictorian address for the Faculty of Science.

Convocation will be a bittersweet moment for Styler who’ll be hooding the final three students who took that leap of faith five years ago and headed east to Mac during the pandemic. All of the original members of her research group have earned their doctorates under Styler’s supervision. “They joined as students and leave as colleagues.”

It turns out this won’t be the final Faculty of Science story written about McCallum. They’re returning to McMaster as both a colleague and co-founder, working alongside Styler as a postdoctoral fellow, commercializing their art conservation research.

“Kay was a star in every sense – an excellent grad student, a brilliant scientist, a gifted communicator and an outstanding citizen of our group and the university,” says Styler. “I can’t imagine anyone else I’d rather launch a company with.”