The Atomic Building
Description
Description: This is an in class activity I use for first year general chemistry students to understand the relationship between quantum numbers and the structure of the atom.
Solar-Powered Oxidation of Water
Description
Students in a half-credit nanomaterials chemistry course read an article describing the electrochemical deposition of BiVO4 (Kyoung-Shin Choi and Jason A. Seabold, “Efficient and Stable Photo-Oxidation of Water by a Bismuth Vanadate Photoanode Coupled with an Iron Oxyhydroxide Oxygen Evolution Catalyst” J. Am. Chem. Soc.
Crystal Field Theory: Analysis of the Iron Sites in Gillespite
Description
This in-class activity explores the electronic structure and spectroscopy of the square-planar iron(II) sites in the mineral gillespite through a crystal field theory approach. This activity is designed for an advanced inorganic chemistry course where group theory and more advanced topics in ligand field theory are taught. The activity is based on the work detailed in the paper: Burn, R. G.; Clark, M. G.; Stone, A. J. Inorg.
Understanding Hypervalency Activity
Description
This activity is meant to teach students an MO theory interpretation of hypervalency that goes beyond the simple (and somewhat unsatisfying) explanation that atoms that are in the third row and below use d-orbitals for bonding in addition to s- and p-orbitals. Specifically, students will be learning how to construct MO diagrams for multicenter bonding schemes (i.e., 3c4e).
IC Top 10 first day activity
Description
I modified the Barb Reisner/Joanne Stewart/Maggie Geselbracht First Day TOC activity (https://www.ionicviper.org/class-activity/introducing-inorganic-chemist…) to take advantage of the quarterly list of Top 10 Most Read articles that IC sends out. This is delivered to me as an email from ACS pubs and I am sure that it is available to anyone who wished to subscribe to the updates. I have attached a pdf copy of the August 2013 update as an example.
Synthesis and Migratory-Insertion Reactivity of CpMo(CO)3(CH3): Small-Scale Organometallic Preparations Utilizing Modern Glove-Box Techniques
Description
This laboratory experiment spans three weeks and introduces advanced undergraduates to modern small-scale synthesis techniques involving an inert-atmosphere glove box. The robust syntheses transform [CpMo(CO3]2 into the methylated CpMo(CO)3(CH3) and examine the phosphine-induced migratory insertion to form various Cp-supported Mo(II) acetyl complexes. At each step in the synthesis, a combination of IR and multinuclear (1H, 13C, and 31P) NMR spectroscopies allow students to assess the purity of their products and
Five Slides About a Simple powder XRD Analysis
Description
These slides walk students through a solid state synthesis with a simple powder XRD analysis. This presentation was made to answer the question “How do I know what came out of the furnace?” for a general chemistry audience, assuming very little XRD knowledge. Specifically this shows using XRD with database searching to determine phase purity through pattern matching.
(This does not cover the fundamentals of XRD, please see related links for that.)
Five Slides about X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS)
Description
This is a short presentation giving an overview of x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), meant to be an introduction for those who are unfamiliar with the technique.
Brief introduction to local surface plasmons (LSPRs) for nanoparticle color
Description
This is a very brief introduction to the origin of color in nanoparticle systems. A link to a video is included in the slides that shows the addition of the reducing agent to the gold precursor solution. The link is also available as a Web Resourse (below).
Cmap: Concept Mapping Tool
Description
Cmap Tools is a powerful free program that can be used to create concept maps. The program works on any platform.
Thanks to Kurt Birdwhistell for posting the link to this tool to the forum a while back.