NORTON - To grasp the impact that retired chemistry professor Bojan Hamlin Jennings had on Wheaton College, do the math.

Jennings inspired more than 150 chemistry majors over her four decades at Wheaton, including two current Wheaton professors and one administrator, according to college officials.

And Wheaton added a biochemistry major during the 1980s, during Jennings' seven-year tenure as chemistry department head.

Jennings, who joined the Wheaton faculty during World War II, retired in 1985.

More than 20 years later, on Oct. 30, Wheaton honored her with an honorary doctor of science degree. The honor for the professor of chemistry emerita came on the heels of an unrelated milestone at the college: the groundbreaking for the new Center for Scientific Inquiry and Innovation. This interview was conducted by e-mail.

SUN CHRONICLE: So, what drew you to chemistry?

BOJAN JENNINGS: I started Bryn Mawr College as a pre-med and chemistry was required for pre-meds.

SC: Which do you enjoy more, teaching or research?

JENNINGS: Both equally. Why? Because research reinforces teaching and I involved undergraduates in research for years.

SC: What brought you to Wheaton?

JENNINGS: I started at Wheaton in the middle of World War II. I had just received my master's degree in chemistry from Radcliffe. Wheaton needed a chemist and I was greatly attracted to Wheaton. My husband was in the Navy at the time.

SC: What was Wheaton's chemistry department like when you joined it? Did you experience any gender bias?

JENNINGS: The department consisted of two women Ph.Ds, Dr. Mildred Evans and Dr. Maud Marshall. Very unusual for women to have earned a Ph.D. in chemistry at the time. (There was also a woman lab assistant.)

So there was no gender bias! SC: What was the biggest professional challenge you faced at Wheaton?

JENNINGS: I wanted to stay at Wheaton and to do that I knew I would need more than a master's degree. By 1948, we had two children, so I had to juggle teaching, the family, and returning to graduate school at Harvard all at once. Therefore, it took a while, but I earned my Ph.D. by 1955.

SC: I hear that you designed Wheaton's biochemistry major. What inspired you to do so?

JENNINGS: That information is not quite right. The entire department designed the biochemistry major, in conjunction with the biology department, as far as I can recall. No particular inspiration involved. It was obvious that biochemistry was becoming very important.

The "new" biochemistry - that is, evolving from Watson and Crick's and Rosalind Franklin's discovery (1951) of the structure of DNA - the double helix, now familiar to everyone who has taken biology in high school. That discovery all but dispensed with the old-fashioned biochemistry, which was primarily concerned with such things as the formulae, biosyntheses and metabolism of sugars, fats and proteins.

SC: Does the biotech boom surprise you?

JENNINGS: Not really. The development of sophisticated technology for wartime use during World War II was a natural and necessary precursor, but anyone following the developments could see what was coming.

SC: What's the next new science major that you see Wheaton needing over the next five years?

JENNINGS: I would like to see engineering enter the picture.

SC: You co-authored, with your students, 10 articles in scientific journals. If you could write an 11th, what would it be about?

JENNINGS: At this stage of the game, I really cannot say. I have, after all, been away from the forefront of chemistry for a long time.

SC: Wheaton just broke ground on its new Center for Scientific Inquiry and Innovation. Did you have any input into the design? Is there a feature that you're especially excited about?

JENNINGS: I had no input, and I am not really familiar with the design, but I understand that it promotes interdisciplinary interaction, which I see as the wave of the future. I applaud that.