National ACS Award Winners 2022 LO Collection
This collection of learning objects was created to celebrate the National ACS Award Winners 2022 who are members of the Division of Inorganic Chemistry. The list of award winners is shown below.
SLiThErs - Supporting Learning with Interactive Teaching: a Hosted, Engaging Roundtable
Chip Nataro / Lafayette College
Thu, 12/17/2020 - 14:18
A collection of all of the IONiC VIPEr SLiThErs (Supporting Learning with Interactive Teaching: a Hosted, Engaging Roundtable). These events are short presentations on a topic followed by a period of discussion between the presenter and live participants. Each of these events is recorded and posted to the IONiC VIPEr YouTube Channel.
Interpreting Tanabe-Sunago diagrams
Description
I was lecturing along today, teaching the basics of the theory and how to interpret Tanabe-Sunago diagrams, and I got to my slides where I show them how to calculate ∆o from Co(en)3, and it just fell apart. I had done V(III) as a first example, and then I wanted the students to practice the calculations, but my slides were not up to the task. I thought to myself, in the moment, this would be a good opportunity to do an in-class activity, I should write it. So, in the spirit of making next year easier, I did. I have not used this in class, but I wish I had had it this morning.
3D Printed Crystal Structure Activity
Chris Stromberg / Hood College
Wed, 03/19/2025 - 18:49
Description
This exercises uses beads to help show how different crystal structures are formed. The exercise includes 3D-printed boxes with starting structures incorporated in the bottom to increase the stability of structures that students build. The exercise also includes a number of additional 3D-printed manipulatives to help students visualize the unit cells and other properties of different crystal structures. These include unit cells with accurate atomic and hold dimensions and several different ways to visualize the layer structures in close-packed structures.
Scandium Carbonyls - mysterious myth or legendary legend?
Description
This literature discussion is based on a short JACS communication reporting the first isolable Sc(II) carbonyls (not a typo) and isocyanides. The paper discusses some standard synthesis and characterization while exploring a more fundamental question regarding why Sc, a d-block metal, is considered a rare-earth and when it stops reacting analogously to the rare-earth metals. The LO focuses on ye olde carbonyl stretching frequencies and back-bonding and makes a nice follow up to an introduction to that concept. It tries to make students explicitly connect electron configuration to changes
Nickel-Catalyzed Enantioconvergent and Diastereoselective Allenylation of Alkyl Electrophiles: Simultaneous Control of Central and Axial Chirality (Greg C. Fu)
Description
This literature discussion LO was created for the ACS National Award Winners 2025 collection. Dr. Greg C. Fu for being the recipient of the Gabor A. Somorjai Award for Creative Research in Catalysis 2025 from the American Chemical Society.
National ACS Award Winners 2025 LO Collection
This collection of learning objects was created to celebrate the National ACS Award Winners 2025 who conduct research related to inorganic chemistry.
The list of award winners included in this collection are shown below. (* denotes learning object pending) IONiC members are welcome to develop more LOs for the collection.
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Adducts of XeO3
Description
This literature discussion was prepared as part of the 2025 ACS awards collection in honor of Gary J. Schrobilgen, winner of the M. Frederick Hawthorne Award in Main Group Inorganic Chemistry.
Geometry of macrocyclic Cu complexes
Description
This literature discussion introduces students to various tetradentate ligands not commonly seen in textbooks. Students can apply knowledge of ligand binding to predict coordination geometry while exploring how the 3D nature of more complex ligands can affect their coordination to a metal.
Flipping Cobalt Spin States
Description
This activity was designed to assess student comprehension of how changes in pi-donation from ligands can affect both crystal field splitting and metal spin states. The activity requires students to practice electron counting, idealized crystal field splitting, and then apply these concepts to explain the observed change from low to high spin caused by the loss of a proton.