This learning object was developed at the 2012 NSF sponsored cCWCS VIPEr workshop at UNC-CH where we were fortunate to hear Jillian Dempsey present this research that has appeal to students. This work focuses on an exciting and promising strategy to develop new technology to support a solar energy economy. This literature discussion leads students through a current application in the field of electrocatalysis.

This literature review covers a paper by the Brookhart group in which they describe a very interesting catalytic route for reducing alkyl halides. The paper describes the catalytic mechanism in great detail and shows an unexpected trend in relative reactivities (Br > Cl > I and primary > secondary). One of the primary benefits for using this paper is that it can enable your students to rationalize a mechanism consistent with many different data sets.

This is intended as a guided reading assignment for the JACS Communication, “Mechanism for the Activation of Carbon Monoxide via Oxorhenium Complexes” by Smeltz, Boyle, and Ison; J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2011, 133, 13288-13291. This article will expose students to newly published research and novel reaction mechanisms. It will require students to apply their knowledge of electron counting and organometallic mechanisms.

This paper is from a Science article from Alan Goldman’s group at Rutgers University. It was one of the literature articles that was assigned during the IONiC VIPEr Workshop in July 2012.  In conjunction with reading the article, workshop participants attended a seminar presented by Alan Goldman on this work.

I teach advanced inorganic chemistry and wanted to find ways to bring in the primary literature, applications, and current research areas.  Students read the article, "Role of Defects in Single-Walled Carbon Nanotube Chemical Sensors" by Eric S. Snow, Nanoletters 2006, 6 (8) pp.

Searching and reading the literature is an important tool in teaching organometallic chemistry. This overall project focuses on the improving students' writing skills and to begin to think critically about articles in the literature through a series of different writing assignments. This project is used in a semester long course on organometallics and reaction mechanisms. The first assignment (this LO) is a summary, the second is related to the NSF highlight, and the third is a literature critique.