Group theory & applications

SLiThErs - Supporting Learning with Interactive Teaching: a Hosted, Engaging Roundtable

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.

Chip Nataro / Lafayette College Thu, 12/17/2020 - 14:18

Rhenium isocyanide complexes from the Figueroa group

Submitted by Chip Nataro / Lafayette College on Tue, 08/26/2025 - 13:34

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.

From Whiteboard to Spartan: An Integrated Exploration of H2A Molecular Orbitals and Molecular Geometry

Submitted by Max Wallace / Colorado State University Pueblo on Wed, 07/16/2025 - 18:54

Description

This two-part activity offers an integrated approach to understanding molecular orbitals and molecular geometry. In class, students will first engage in a hands on, qualitative construction of the H₂O molecular orbital diagram using symmetry principles and a whiteboard.

Nickel-Catalyzed Enantioconvergent and Diastereoselective Allenylation of Alkyl Electrophiles: Simultaneous Control of Central and Axial Chirality (Greg C. Fu)

Submitted by Shirley Lin / United States Naval Academy on Sat, 03/01/2025 - 14:36

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.

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.

Chip Nataro / Lafayette College Wed, 02/26/2025 - 14:03

Moleculuar Computation and Visualization in Undergraduate Education (MoleCVUE)

Description

The MoleCVUE website contains several items that should be of interest to the VIPEr community, especially the activities. Each activity is designed to be ready to deploy in lecture, laboratory, or as homework. There are activities covering all of the major subdisciplines of chemistry (some more than others). Some activities that might be of particular interest to VIPEr are "Group Theory", "VSEPR", and "Electron Configurations of Atoms and Ions". All of the activities are written to use WebMO, but could be adapted for other systems. Most activities are doable with the free or demo versi

Kevin Range / Commonwealth University of Pennsylvania Fri, 08/09/2024 - 13:01

Literature Discussion Group Project

Description

This is a literature-based end of semester project. After a semester of introducing literature in the form of typical literature discussions, this assignment is given to small groups. It may be easily amended or added to. Each group is provided with a paper and accompanying questions that are similar to the literature discussions they have done over the semester. They then must use these guiding questions to assemble a presentation to the class. The topics chosen and the guiding questions are designed to provide students with a taste of the many areas of inorganic chemistry that are no

Wes Farrell / United States Naval Academy Mon, 08/05/2024 - 14:23

Literature discussion for “Synthesis and characterization of a formal 21-electron cobaltocene derivative.”

Description

This is a literature discussion regarding electron counting. It involves several opportunities for students to use CBC to determine electron counts themselves. Then, it demonstrates the first case of a 21-electron complex, which leads to great discussion regarding the 18-electron rule. Throughout the discussion, students are introduced to many structural and spectrochemical analyses, some of which may be new to them.

Wes Farrell / United States Naval Academy Wed, 05/15/2024 - 14:34

Theoretical Analysis of Fe K-edge XANES on Iron Pentacarbonyl

Description

This article focuses on a theoretical analysis of K-edge X-ray Absorption Near Edge Structure (XANES) of Fe(CO)₅ in the D_3h and C_4v geometries. For the context of a one semester inorganic chemistry / physical inorganic chemistry course, the authors use computational methods and experimental X-ray techniques to generate the XANES spectra of two different geometries of Fe(CO)₅. Densities of states are used to show overlap between specific orbitals (Fe p with C p), indicating pi-backbonding.

Prajay Patel / University of Dallas Tue, 04/30/2024 - 15:01

Europium-based Contrast Agents

Submitted by Sibrina Collins / College of Arts and Sciences at Lawrence Technological University on Thu, 03/21/2024 - 15:34

Description

This learning object (LO) focuses on a recent JACS paper (J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2022, 144, 23053 -23060), which explores the chemistry of Eu^II-based contrast agents.

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