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For Georgia Gwinnett College’s (GGC) Dr. Ajay Mallia, associate professor of chemistry, his passion for chemistry and the role it plays in everyday life is something he’s passing along to his students in a new way.

“This is a new class I designed to help students understand and enjoy chemistry because chemistry is everywhere,” he said. “The knowledge of chemistry is very important in our daily lives.”

Mallia’s integrated chemistry lab students begin their work in the field by collecting tomatoes growing in GGC’s microfarm on campus.

“Their goal is to purify a chemical called lycopene from those tomatoes and test for its antioxidant properties,” he said. “This experiment gives the students the ability to apply what they’ve learned and see how it impacts the world we live in.”

Lycopene, he said, is a natural plant chemical that gives tomatoes their red color. As an antioxidant, it also known for bone health and may help protect against high blood sugar, certain cancers and heart disease. Other plants that have this natural chemical include sweet red peppers and watermelon.

“The term antioxidant is a familiar term to our students and the public in general,” Mallia said. “It’s my hope that having them look at it from a chemical perspective will encourage their interest in chemistry and its role in the world.”

View and download extraction of lycopene photos.