Prof. J. C. Baird

Some Technical Stuff

This course is going to be a bit different than a traditional one. We are going to use technology in the interests of making helpful information available on the internet. Everything will be there: syllabus, lecture notes (denoted by the symbol ), previous exams, homework problems and answers, old finals and as they are available the results of hour exams, the final and even the lectures (in RealAudio and denoted by the symbol ).

Using the internet in the way you are right now allows one to use HTML (hypertext markup language) and one of the things good about that is that you do not have to look at all the detail-it can be hidden and is available by clicking on a highlighted text. That means that it is (or should be) the forest that is presented and if you want to peruse the trees they are available. It should be that this technology is better than a text book in that all those interesting side bars in the text do not appear unless you want them to. There is a danger in teaching, and I am guilty, that too much periferal material will be given when we are trying to struggle with a single idea, or problem. HTML and the internet ought to make that better because it is set up to focus on a given page, while at the same time allowing the "lecturer" the pleasure of adding favorite and interesting material-buried under a clickable phrase.

We shall attempt to add another dimension and this we will call Internet Active Concept Tests. The idea is to answer questions, working in groups in your living quarters, or computer clusters, that are conceptual in nature. You will enter your answers (multiple choice) with a written reason using your computer and when satisfied submit it electronically. To see a Chem 22 type example click here. For this effort you get course credit of up to 5% of the course grade for all the tests (4% for just trying). In class, we shall have another discussion, further questions and since these questions are based on lecture experiments we can see how it all works out in practice. By the way, another 5% of the course points for the answers to class questions submitted in class, or on the internet. Effort should be rewarded. There are 10 of these Concept Tests. The idea is to understand concepts as opposed to working numerical problems.

Excepting for the classroom work you can take this course, if you have internet access, from the Amazonian jungle! Of course you will miss the lab-and that is 1/3 of course points. It is important to mention that chemistry is a laboratory science. Grades in this course are on an absolute scale. The exact demarkation is not decided yet, but above somewhere in the low to mid 80's is an A. You are competing against knowledge, not each other. We really want to learn the material-the Concepts Tests are supposed to be a help. Furthermore, this course, though using the same text, is seperate from the other section. That is, this is our course, our exams and our grades. There is a syllabus which explains the point totals of the different components of the course (hour exams, final, lab and concept tests) as well as a tentative schedule of lectures.

Introduction

The subject matter of this course is general chemistry. The reason for studying this subject is to lay the foundation for an understanding of fundamental chemical processes. These processes occur everywhere in daily life and form the basis for further understanding and study in many fields of science, the environment and medicine.

For example, the problem of global warming (the greenhouse effect) is a result of introduction into the atmosphere of various molecules like carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides, hydrocarbons, chlorinated hydrocarbons, etc. that absorb infrared radiation (heat radiation) reflecting it back to earth. There are wealth of chemical, geological and biological problems here. Think of rate processes and transport of carbon dioxide through the atmosphere into the seas and on into limestone deposites. Even the simple chemistry of CO2 in water is important! Modeling has been important in understanding global warming as they are also helpful in understanding all chemical phenomena. Is global warming a danger? Here is a conservative view.

Ozone depletion is another example where chemicals used by man and inserted into the upper atmosphere enter complex chemical reactions that result in the removal of ozone-with concomitant increase in ultraviolet light getting through to earth. Here is a representation of ozone concentration in the atmosphere above antartica

As our understanding of the molecular basis of biology continues, our reliance and use of fundamental chemical principles will also continue. Furthermore, as advances continue to be made there will be great benefit to humankind in making life more pleasant.

An example of all this is the continuing work on the detailed molecular structure of enzymes. An enzyme is a biological catalyst, a molecule that makes reactions proceed faster (reach their equilibrium concentrations faster). As information about the enzyme geometry unfolds we can see how it is that they function and how reactant molecules must fit into the molecular arrangement of the enzyme in order for a biochemical reaction to occur. Many enzymes contain not only carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur, but inorganic ions such as Mg⁺⁺, Fe⁺⁺, Fe⁺⁺⁺, Cu⁺⁺, etc. Bonding to these inorganic species has to cause local structure in the biological molecule that must be important.

We might speculate that in the case of a virus we must have the same kinds of chemical manifestation, and that detailed molecular structure of these macromolecules would enable us to understand on a fundamental level just how viruses work. If we know the chemical details of the enzymes and other molecular entities then we may be able to control them. Needless to say, there continue to be advances in knowledge of molecular structure in virology. Think of the usefullness if we knew the molecular properties of the Ebola virus.

If we generalize our enzyme example, we can see that we need to understand such things as molecular structure, chemical reactivity, the chemical forces taking reactions to equilibrium, the role of temperature, pressure, and concentration, the chemistry of hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, sulfur, iron, copper, cobalt, aluminum, etc. in order to even partially understand biochemical reactivity. We haven't even mentioned the genetic code!

Recently the Hubble Space Telescope was pointed at an uninteresting part of the heavens just to see what was there. The exposure was long enough to probe some 14 billions years ago-about a billions years after the beginning! Chemistry is envolved in the sense that the analysis of the light into its spectrum and the information about the atoms and their state is basic spectroscopy-and chemistry. For a photo click here.

There is a vast amount of material in chemistry and we cannot cover it all. We can strive to discuss some interesting subjects-and gain both an understanding of some fundamentals and especially develop chemical intuition.

Finally, there is the noble goal of understanding nature and how matter works. It is with these lofty ideals that we undertake a study of this elementary subject of general chemistry.

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