chemistry

Sally Brooker

Sally Brooker is a chemistry topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Sally Brooker rather than just read about it. In short: Sally Anne Brooker is a New Zealand inorganic chemist. She has been a full professor at the University of Otago since 2006.

Key takeaways

Sally Brooker belongs to chemistry; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Sally Brooker to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Sally Brooker from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Sally Anne Brooker is a New Zealand inorganic chemist. She has been a full professor at the University of Otago since 2006.

Education Brooker was educated at Hawarden Area School in North Canterbury from 1970 to 1982, and was dux of the school in her final year there. She went on to study chemistry at the University of Canterbury, first graduating Bachelor of Science with first-class honours, and then completing a PhD titled Synthesis and characterisation of polynuclear complexes with macrocyclic and related ligands under the supervision of Vickie McKee in 1989.

Academic and research career After a period of post-doctoral research with George Sheldrick at the University of Göttingen, Brooker returned to New Zealand to take up a lectureship in chemistry at the University of Otago in 1991. She rose to become a full professor in 2006. Brooker's research is in the fields of transition-metal and macrocyclic chemistry. Her work has included the development of molecular switches and molecular magnets, with potential application in nanodevices.

Honours and awards

In the 2017 Queen's Birthday Honours, Brooker was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to science. Later that year, she won the Hector Medal from the Royal Society of New Zealand. Also in 2017, Brooker was selected as one of the Royal Society Te Apārangi's "150 women in 150 words", celebrating the contributions of women to knowledge in New Zealand. Brooker was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand in 2007, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2011. She is also a Fellow of the New Zealand Institute of Chemistry. In October 2019, Brooker was appointed one of seven inaugural sesquicentennial distinguished chairs, or poutoko taiea, at Otago University. She was awarded the University's Distinguished Research Medal in 2015.

Selected works Klingele, Marco H.; Brooker, Sally (2003). "The coordination chemistry of 4-substituted 3, 5-di (2-pyridyl)-4H-1, 2, 4-triazoles and related ligands". Coordination Chemistry Reviews. 241 (1–2): 119–132. doi:10.1016/s0010-8545(03)00049-3. Feltham, Humphrey L.C.; Brooker, Sally (2014). "Review of purely 4f and mixed-metal nd-4f single-molecule magnets containing only one lanthanide ion". Coordination Chemistry Reviews. 276: 1–33. doi:10.1016/j.ccr.2014.05.011. Beckmann, Udo; Brooker, Sally (2003). "Cobalt (II) complexes of pyridazine or triazole containing ligands: spin-state control". Coordination Chemistry Reviews. 245 (1–2): 17–29. doi:10.1016/s0010-8545(03)00030-4. Feltham, Humphrey L.C.; Lan, Yanhua; Klöwer, Frederik; Ungur, Liviu; Chibotaru, Liviu F.; Powell, Annie K.; Brooker, Sally (2011). "A non‐sandwiched macrocyclic monolanthanide single‐molecule magnet: the key role of axiality". Chemistry – A European Journal. 17 (16): 4362–4365. doi:10.1002/chem.201100438. PMID 21432925. Brooker, Sally (2001). "Complexes of thiophenolate-containing Schiff-base macrocycles and their amine analogues". Coordination Chemistry Reviews. 222 (1): 33–56. doi:10.1016/s0010-8545(01)00300-9. Rodriguez-Jimenez, Santiago; Yang, Mingrui; Stewart, Ian; Garden, Anna L.; Brooker, Sally (2017). "A simple method of predicting spin state in solution". Journal of the American Chemical Society. 139 (50): 18392–18396. doi:10.1021/jacs.7b11069. PMID 29156884.

References

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Sally Brooker

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Sally Brooker claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In chemistry, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Sally Brooker before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Sally Brooker ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Sally Brooker

In research: Sally Brooker appears in chemistry research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Sally Brooker in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Sally Brooker is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Academic staff of the University of Otago, Fellows of the New Zealand Institute of Chemistry, Fellows of the Royal Society of Chemistry, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Sally Brooker outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Sally Brooker in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Sally Brooker means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Sally Brooker out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Sally Brooker in simple terms?

Sally Anne Brooker is a New Zealand inorganic chemist. She has been a full professor at the University of Otago since 2006.

Why does Sally Brooker matter?

Because it connects several chemistry ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Sally Brooker?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Sally Brooker.