Students win prizes for homemade spectrometers

At one of the largest school science competitions in the world, there have always been low numbers competitors with chemistry projects. Teachers suggest this might be because school labs lack the analytical equipment needed for most chemistry projects. However, this year prizes went to a number of innovative students who built homemade spectrometers for their chemical analysis. Booking a Royal Society of Chemistry Spectroscopy in a Suitcase visit for hands-on experience or contacting your local university chemistry department for help running analyses are other ways to get access to spectrometers.