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.
Interactive Tanabe-Sugano diagram
Patrick Holland / Yale University
Tue, 02/03/2026 - 21:35
Description
As a collaboration with Rajas Ketkar (an excellent student in my inorganic chemistry class), we now have an online tool that you can use to "pull" a vertical line across each Tanabe-Sugano diagram and read off the intersecting E/B values. This should make the process easier and more intuitive for students. Please credit Rajas when using in your classes!
Characterization of group VI carbonyls with bidentate phosphines
Description
This literature discussion comes from a paper in the Turkish Journal of Chemistry (1999, 23, 9-14) https://journals.tubitak.gov.tr/chem/vol23/iss1/2/. In this paper, the authors report spectroscopic data for nine compounds, [M(CO)4(PP)] (M = Cr, Mo or W; PP = dppm, dppe, dppp). This is a very fundamental paper and as such, students are not expected to have had any significant coursework in inorganic chemistry.
Modeling Non-Heme Iron Halogenases: High-Spin Oxoiron(IV)-Halide Complexes That Halogenate C-H Bonds
Description
This literature discussion explores a paper by the Que group that creates and characterizes spectroscopic and functional model complexes of non-heme iron halogenases.
Flavodiiron Oxygen Reductase
Amanda Reig / Ursinus College
Thu, 11/20/2025 - 09:44
Description
This paper investigates factors that influence substrate specificity (O2 versus NO reductase activity) within flavodiiron enzymes. The authors mutate potentially relevant amino acids and investigate the biochemical and biophysical properties by UV-visible and EPR spectroscopies.
1FLO: Addition of H2 to four-coordinate iridium
Description
This paper (J. Organomet. Chem. 2022, 965-966, 122317) describes the synthesis and reactivity of four-coordinate iridium compound with a tridentate ligand. This ligand is referred to in the paper as a pincer ligand which are a general class of tridentate ligands that coordinate in a mer- arrangement.
2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry - MOFs
Chip Nataro / Lafayette College
Wed, 10/08/2025 - 08:43
In celebration of the 2025 Nobel prize in Chemistry awarded to Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson and Omar Yagi, this collection features various LOs about MOFs.
Metallocene cations and anions
Description
This is a really interesting paper in J. Am. Chem. Soc. (2025, 147, 34641-34646) involving a complex salt in which both the cation and anion are metallocenes. While a majority of the paper is focused on the characterization of two new compounds, it presents some excellent opportunities to practice counting electrons, one of which was a challenge to this author.
Rhenium isocyanide complexes from the Figueroa group
Description
This literature discussion is in honor of Dr. Josh Figueroa, recipient of the 2026 F. Albert Cotton Award in Synthetic Inorganic Chemistry. Josh has done some tremendous work with isocyanide ligands and this paper is but a brief glimpse into this field. The complexes of interest contain carbonyl ligands and isocyanide ligands, so there are plenty of opportunities for students to use group theory to predict the number of IR-active vibrations for these ligands.
Hydrocyanation
Description
This literature discussion was inspired by a talk given by Dr. Nora Radu, recipient of the 2025 ACS Award for Distinguished Service in the Advancement of Inorganic Chemistry. It is a bit 'big picture' in nature in that the hydrocyanation reaction is important for the synthesis of nylon. As such, there is a significant amount of background material relating to nylon-6,6. Students will read an article from C&EN, portions of a patent, and portions of an article from J. Chem.