by Elodie Kadjo

Dr. Carolyn Carta is a Principal scientist at CArtLab Solutions, a research and consulting company she founded in September 2023. As shown through her entrepreneurial endeavor, Carolyn takes initiative and is not afraid to create a path to fit her needs.

Growing up, Carolyn liked science and art, and decided to combine her two most obvious talents into a self-designed Bachelor’s degree in chemistry and art. This, however, was not an easy route. Talking about her academic journey, Carolyn says with a laugh, “Many people didn’t know how they would work with me because I put art and chemistry on my college applications”. Thus, she enrolled at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Within the first year, she realized that regardless of her love for art, studio art was not a good career fit. Indeed, she preferred the use of stable materials that would allow her artworks to last longer compared to her peers who were dumpster diving for supplies and thus less concerned about the conservation of their art.

Nevertheless, Carolyn did not abandon her passion and enrolled at Trinity College-Hartford Connecticut where she took a “Chemistry Science in Art” class with Dr. Henry DePhilips.  Carolyn’s interaction with Dr. DePhilips was instrumental in shaping her trajectory for the next 15 years. At Trinity College, Carolyn took the initiative to design her major to fit her aspirations and modeled her degree with the goal of getting into art conservation school. Her degree was titled “An Analysis of Art”. “It is a Combination of art history, studio art, and chemistry” Carolyn explains.  Dr. DePhilips went on to become Carolyn’s advisor and mentor during her undergraduate studies. Under his guidance, she was invited to do an independent study in Rome on art conservation. There, Carolyn leveraged her persistent attitude to gain insight into classified conservation practices at the Victor Emmanuale Monument, and was given the chance to present her research at a lecture series at the New Britain Museum of American Art in 2009.

After her undergraduate, Carolyn worked as an intern at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. In the art conservation lab, Carolyn learned the instrumentation and sample preparation necessary to analyze art objects, including how to take forensic sized or nondestructive sampling techniques and also make mock-ups to represent historically and chemically accurate art experiments. She discovered she was good at organic chemistry and enjoyed the scientific aspect of art conservation. “I realized that I was preparing for an art conservation role while an art conservation science job was more suited to my abilities. I was not sure about the route to take for the future, so I went for a Master’s degree at a terminal MS program to gain additional lab experience,” she explained.

Carolyn completed a Master’s in Chemistry at the College of William and Mary in Virginia, where she juggled both her NSF applied research into xanthene-based dye sensors for detecting heavy metals for in-situ water measurements, while using the same dye to embed into thin polymer films to study photooxidation. Following her master’s degree, Carolyn’s hunger for scientific testing knowledge pushed her to pursue a PhD in Materials Science and Engineering at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). “Even though I loved chemistry, I felt like I would benefit from understanding all the properties of heterogeneous materials used to make art,” she explained. Given her lack of engineering background, this was an ambitious task. Nethertheless, Carolyn passed the oral qualifying exam the first time. “Only the top 10% of graduating doctoral class was able to accomplish this” she remarked with a proud smile. 

While working toward her Ph.D, Carolyn also used her network and passion for art conservation to secure a 2 year job at the Getty Conservation Institute (GCI), nearby to UCLA. At the GCI, Carolyn implemented a system for better testing and storage of art artifacts made of plastic composites. One of her major accomplishments was on a project with the Walt Disney Animation Library. “When I joined the team, samples were random, uncoordinated, and disorganized, so I worked directly with different stakeholders at Walt Disney Animation Research Library (ARL) to obtain valid sample sets, obtain enough samples to complete mechanical and chemical analysis, to create accelerated aging experiments to predict material lifetimes, and also measure environmental variations within storage of 10 vaults of animation cels.” she explains. Cels are transparent sheets of plastics on which painted drawings for traditional animation were filmed. Coordinating thermogravimetric measurements and mechanical properties of paints, Carolyn helped improve storage of more than 500,000 cels of the original Walt Disney animated characters, including her childhood favorites- the princesses.

Despite her tenure of 5 years working at the GCI and long term experience in art conservation science, the COVID pandemic began to create social and material supply chain issues that were hard for Carolyn to ignore. With her chemistry and material science knowledge, Carolyn accepted a position as a Research and Development Scientist at Younger Optics to contribute to medical device material and process development. There, she worked with an international team on translating the injection mode of eyeglasses into a 3D printing process. “Within my first few months learning about the lens industry and installing the first 3D printer for lens manufacturing in the US, I noticed a limitation in the mechanical and adhesive characterization of the new lens materials, and immediately initiated a collaborative study with a physicist colleague in Madrid to improve collaboration with industry experts at PPG industries (https://www.ppg.com/en-US), a US based paint and coatings supplier.” At the same time, driven by her desire to give back to the community, Carolyn worked as a STEM mentor for the company College Impact, part of AccepU.

Although Carolyn enjoyed the collaborative atmosphere at Younger Optics, she moved to Chicago to be closer to her family and accepted a position at a startup called LuxCreo as an Senior Applications and Integration Engineer to improve the 3D printing of photopolymers in dental and shoe sole products. Within her first 90 days at LuxCreo, Carolyn designed experiments that led to process improvement. When implemented, her designs will save clients 35% processing time for digital dentistry solutions, while also saving hundreds of dollars in hardware costs to the processing of dental implants. Further, she developed new packaging techniques thanks to her experience in plastic storage from her work at Walt Disney Animation Research Library to ensure longevity of parts. Stimulated by the entrepreneurial environment in her new position, but craving non-traditional manufacturing environments where equity was valued, Carolyn decided to open her own technical consulting company, CArtLab Solutions (https://cartlabsolutions.com/). Thanks to a Landis fellowship (https://www.mhubchicago.com/hardtech-development-fellowship), Carolyn’s company is based at the Chicago mHUB where she gets to collaborate with other scientists and learn about the business aspects of running a company.

“In my recent work starting my own company, I am proud of my focus on mission driven work to help serve my clients in an equitable way with a focus on sustainable materials and processes. It’s really important to me that I am creating a safe space and terms to do research and development for myself, but also for any women/BIPOC that I work with both now and in the future. I’m also proud to register my business as a women-owned small business for future contract opportunities with the federal government,” she adds. Currently, Carolyn is focused on sustainable technology solutions, carbon capture material development, medical device technology particularly women’s health in collaboration with companies like Iantrek, Curiva (TM), and The Immortal Water Company.

Her secret for effective work and life balance is to always keep in mind her three life pillars: profession, health, and community. “Make sure one important part of your life does not get out of control and take over your other priorities”, she advises with a laugh. “It is true that sometimes you would have to prioritize one aspect over the other ones but make sure it is just for a short time”. She practices this now by attending to her needs by doing yoga, meditation, and mindfulness. Carolyn also loves reading and recommends “A Renaissance of Our Own” by Rachel E. Cargle, an inspiring autobiography that encourages people to carve their own paths. Reflecting on her journey, Carolyn admits she should have been kinder to herself when things along her journey blossomed differently than originally sketched in her plans.