Understanding Unoccupied (or empty) Space in Solid Structures
Description
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DePauw University
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Formal NSF Styled Proposal Writing in Preparation for Original Multi-Week Laboratory Projects
Description
The advanced inorganic chemistry course is completed by all chemistry majors at Wabash College during the fall of their senior year. The capstone character of the course provides an excellent opportunity for utilizing an investigator model of laboratory learning. Student teams are responsible for the preparation of a formal, National Science Foundation (NSF) styled proposal stating the goals, context, experimental timetable, safety considerations, and budget for the execution of an original laboratory project.
Electron Counting
Description
I use these two handouts early in my inorganic course to outline how to count electrons and assign ligand types in a metal complex. I introduce it early so that I can use the terms "X" and "L" in class. I come back to it and hit it again when I do my unit on organometallics. The "ligands" handout is my interpretation of the MLH Green paper from 1995 (Green, M. L. H., J. Organometal.
Element Jeopardy!
Description
Like many inorganic faculty (especially those faced with trying to teach "all" of inorganic chemistry in a one-term junior/senior course), I have found it increasingly difficult over the years to include any significant descriptive chemistry content in my course. Moreover, I have a constant interest in trying to convey some of the "story behind the story" in chemistry, which in this area centers on the discovery of the elements. I was mulling this over at an ACS meeting one time and happened to be in an inorganic teaching session where Josh van Houten (St.
Molecular Origami: Precision Scale Models from Paper, by Robert M. Hanson
Description
This book called to me given my fascination with both origami and molecular model kits. While not a textbook in the true sense, the content of the book is pertinent to topics of molecular structure and symmetry and is therefore potentially valuable in both general and inorganic chemistry courses. In addition to the plans for constructing all the models (~125), there is a small amount of background information. Granted, many of these models could more easily be made using traditional model kits, but I had fun building them from paper.
Descriptive Chemistry Wikipedia project
Description
Students select, research, and then post an article on an inorganic compound to Wikipedia. The compounds are chosen from a list of “stubs” (short articles that need to be expanded) found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Inorganic_compound_stubs and might include such items as the synthesis, processes of isolation, structure, interesting facts about the compound in history, and/or an application of the compound.
Google Docs for Summer Research
Description
I am using Google Docs in my research lab for a variety of purposes, and I thought it might be helpful to share how I am using them. Google docs allows simulataneous editing by multiple people, and everyone needs a Google ID to do that. My research group and I are using one document to write up research results in paper format, one document to keep track of weekly goals, one document for general instrumentation and experimental technique trouble-shooting, and one to keep track of any work that occurs after hours when I am not around.
ACS Meeting Content- Slides and Audio
Description
The ACS has posted slides and audio for selected talks from recent national meetings. Students have the opportunity to listen to talks by research leaders whose work may relate to a topic discussed in class or to an undergraduate research project. This will also be a great resource for students who are gathering information about potential graduate research groups.
Introduction to the Synthesis and Properties of Nanoparticles
Description
This activity leads students through the synthesis of compound nanoparticles and examines how key physical properties such as band gap vary with particle size. Prior to doing this, students should have some exposure to the structure of solids, band theory, and band gap as a periodic property (see, for example, Lisensky, et al. J Chem.
The Berry Pseudorotation in PF5
Description
This activity makes use of Jmol animations created by Prof. Marion Cass at Carleton College to illustrate the Berry Pseudorotation in trigonal bipyramidal molecules such as PF5. Students explore the animations and answer a series of questions that lead to a description of this intramolecular motion that exchanges equatorial and axial atoms in trigonal bipyramidal molecules.