Lecture #1 Course Material and Syllabus Overview

Today in lecture I went over the course details from the syllabus, shared a few inspirational quotes, and emphasized that understanding the concepts in the homework sets will be the key to success in this course. Take note that I said "understanding the concepts" in the homework sets, not simply "completing" the homework sets.

Some students get the idea that chemistry professors ask "tricky" questions on exams. We ask questions to see if students understand the material. At The Ohio State University we have a standard of excellence that we must maintain. Part of this is that the A students know the material inside and out. In order to evaluate your knowledge, and separate the A students from the rest of the pack, we need to ask challenging questions involving multiple concepts on the quizzes and exams. I always say that a perfectly written exam will end up with one student getting a 100% and will also separate all the students and give a nice distribution. If this is your definition of "tricky" questions, then yes, expect to see plenty of them on the exams.

I briefly touched over Ksp in the first lecture, but it is a concept that is nearly identical to the concepts covered in chemistry 122, so the lab example problems should have been easy to handle. If you want to get a jump on the material, you should have no problem completing problems 1-18 from the solubility homework set by the end of lecture tomorrow.

I was very happy to see some great evaluation comments from everyone and will post a detailed description of them later tonight. I hope everyone enjoyed the first day of class and had a great start to spring quarter :)

Songs Before Class:
Bruce Springsteen: Glory Days
Mase: Welcome Back

Last Lecture

A few quick announcements:

Final Solar Cell Lab Report due at 5:00 pm today on the Carmen drop box.

Final Exam Review session is at 7:00 pm on Sunday in 1015 McPherson.

The equations/constants given on the final are posted on Carmen.

If you have an issue with grades please send me an e-mail. I will be spending all day Monday grading the Solar Cell lab final reports and getting all grades in order.

Now on to lecture, today I finished the nuclear chemistry unit by briefly performing a half-life calculation and discussing medicinal uses of nuclear chemistry in cancer treatments.

I then discussed the general chemistry concepts we learned this quarter that are involved in cancer research.

Finally, I shared some details from the life of my mother and her battle with cancer. I more detailed description of how things went down can be found here.

For the first time giving this lecture I wrote down the final message I wanted to give and honestly, it never comes out right because I talk too much before hand and run out of time. But basically, I want each of you to think about what Jimmy V said in his ESPY speech about knowing where you came from, where you are, and where you wanna be. Thank those who allowed you to get where you are today. Work hard right now to get where you wanna be.

I would like nothing more than for everyone in class to be successful, both in their academic/professional and personal lives. It takes hard work to get to that point. My last challenge is to #1 Be sure to thank everyone who allowed you to get where you are today. Tell your parents you love them every chance you get because you never know when your last opportunity will be to do so. #2. Don't let anyone outwork you. #3. Dream big and set your goals high and don't let anyone tell you that you cannot accomplish the things you can set your mind to.

At The Ohio State University they say "Amazing Happens." The reason "amazing" happens is because students and administration work hard to get where they are. They didn't just let things happen they made things happen. I want all of you to make it happen.

I wish everyone in here can accomplish their dreams. By being able to teach each and every one of you, I am living mine.

I wish you nothing but the best in the future. Be sure to study your ass off for the final :)

God Bless, Dr. Fus

P.S. Thank you Evan "The Villian" Turner GO BUCKS!

Solar Cell Voltage Readings

Grace Mbogo
Top Gun: 320 mV
No Name: 270 mV
Pomegranaters: 306 mV
The Blue Barracudas: 323 mV

Yujie Sun
Good Guys: 291 mV
SJWL: 170 mV
Berry Cell: 331 mV
Darkwing Ducks: 458 mV
Group 1: 225 mV; 350 mV
Rocket Power: 92 mV

Andrew Zane
Fantastic Six: 312 mV
The Fusinators: 259 mV
Momo: 330 mV
Team K: 245 mV
Nord: 89 mV

Alex Bernard
1337: 347 mV; 295 mV; 311 mV
Team Sufficient: 4449 mV; 332 mV
2nd Row Dragons: 275 mV
Purple Chokeberries: 214 mV; 340 mV
No Name: 356 mV
Group Voltage: 236 mV; 256 mV

Simon Pondaven
JABS: 285 mV; 146 mV
Team Awesome: 280 mV
Doll: 271 mV; 250 mV
GAV: 371 mV; 286 mV
Phillips: 109 mV; 220 mV
The Back Corner Group: 129 mV; 234 mV

Grace Mbogo
Night Watchmen: 206 mV
Team Anything Cool: 239 mV
We Love Donuts: 69 mV
Outlaws: 395 mV
No Name: 302 mV
Earthworm: 327 mV

Scott Burya
Team Tricx: 331 mV; 372 mV
Team Mangosteen: 415 mV
Group #1: 294 mV
Team America: 197 mV
The Champs: 272 mV

Tamara Beilke
Bad Asses: 350 mV; 247 mV
Gryffindor: 248 mV
Jack Bauer: 265 mV
Dr. Fus Beaters: 200 mV
The Stainers: 368 mV

Ishika Sinha
Jamesha and the Mavericks: 309 mV; 321 mV
Unununium: 180 mV; 286 mV; 26 mV
Purple Carrots: 260 mV; 83 mV; 150 mV
Team Domination: 230 mV; 85 mV
No Name: 96 mV; 362 mV
Very Berry: 269 mV; 179 mV

Kevin Cassidy
Team Testosterone: 312 mV; 280 mV; 249 mV
Team Muhammad!!!: 122 mV; 56 mV
Team Nasty: 269 mV
3 Dudes and a Chick: 93 mV
Thundercats!: 27 mV
No Name: 61 mV; 182 mV

Thi Trinh
The Biscuit Eaters: 352 mV
Team Peter North: 330 mV
12: 324 mV
Team Odwalla: 301 mV; 219 mV
The Three Best Friends That Anyone Could Have: 333 mV
Electric Slide: 255 mV; 438 mV

Lecture #29, Wednesday, March 10th

Today I continued with the last part of the alternate energy unit, which consists of topics from nuclear chemistry. I began lecture by stating that chemistry is an experimental science where measurements are made. Chemists observe reactions in the lab and then put together theories and equations based on these observations. I listed various observations on the stability of various isotopes and also showed an example of alpha and beta emissions and ended on the topic of half-life.

On Friday I will finish the nuclear chemistry section and discuss the evaluation comments.

Interesting Article on Nuclear Chemistry

From the March 8, 2010 New York Times...

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/09/science/09enrich.html?hp

Make-Up Quiz

If you happened to miss one of the report question quizzes on Carmen, there is a make-up quiz posted. It is due at the time of the final and there are absolutely no exceptions to the cut off date.

Lecture #28, Monday, March 8th

Today in class I started with Nuclear Chemistry. Nuclear chemistry has become increasingly popular in recent years due to its applications in medicinal chemistry as well as an alternate energy source.

Continuing with our alternate energy theme, Einstein's famous equation, E = mc², allows us to calculate the energy we can gain from nuclear reactions.

There are some key differences between chemical and nuclear reactions. They are...

*In a chemical reaction the electrons react outside the nucleus, while in a nuclear reaction, the protons and neutrons react inside the nucleus.

*In a chemical reaction the same number of each kind of of atom appear in the products and reactants, while in a nuclear reaction, elements transmute into other elements.

*In a chemical isotopes react in the same manner, while in a nuclear reaction, the isotopes react differently.

*Chemical reactions depend on the chemical combination of the reactants, while nuclear reactions are independent of chemical combination.

*In a chemical reaction mass is conserved, while in a nuclear reaction, mass changes are detectable.

*In a chemical reaction the energy changes due to mass are relatively equal, while in a chemical reaction the energy changes due to mass are on the order of 10⁸ Joules.

Be sure to review isotopes and how we write chemical symbols for isotopes and know what a radioisotope is. I also went over alpha, beta, and gamma decay. Be able to identify any missing reactants and/or products in each of these nuclear reactions and we will discuss more detailed nuclear reactions, and the relative stability of radioisotopes in class on Wed.

Final Exam Material

The final exam will be worth 250 points and it will consist of 42 questions each worth 6 points each. The relative breakdown will be something like this:

10 Questions: Electrochemistry

10 Questions: Thermochemistry

10 Questions: Solubility

5 Questions: Transition Metal Chemistry

3 Questions: Nuclear Chemistry

3 Questions: Modern Materials

1 Question: Material Taken from the Last Lecture of the year

There is a little flexibility as I can try to make questions around multiple topics, but that will be the general break-down. Let me know if you have any questions.

Lecture #27, Friday, March 5th

Today we discussed the theory of how a dye sensitized solar cell works, particularly the one we constructed in class using titanium dioxide. TiO₂ by itself cannot conduct electricity and neither can the dye you chose. But if you combine them together and use a redox couple, we can make a Gratzel cell.

After discussing the theory of how our "Donut Solar Cells" operate, I went over the breakdown of the 250 points for the Solar Cell lab. They will be as follows:

25 pts: Relative Amount of TiO₂ extracted from the donut

25 pts: Uniform thickness of TiO₂ film deposited on conducting glass

100 pts: Rational explanation for choice of dye

100 pts: Final Report

If you want to get a head start on the final report, you will need to write up what you did, similar to a procedure, but it needs to be written in a scientific manner. I would first suggest writing out a step by step numerical procedure, then put everything in paragraph form.

I also briefly discussed an overview of the contents of a research paper and will start with that on Monday.

Next week we will conclude our alternate energy unit (and the class in general, which is so sad that we only have three lectures left :( by looking at nuclear chemistry. If you want to get ahead of the material, read the first part of 21.6 and all of sections 21.1 - 21.4.

Lecture #26, Wednesday, March 3rd

A photovoltaic device is used to convert light into electricity at the atomic level. Many practical devices, such as your calculator, run on solar power. A nice description of how solar cells work, which was summarized in class, can be found here. A showed a 2-Dim simplification of crystalline silicon and showed how adding impurity atoms can vastly increase the electrical conductivity of silicon. When silicon atoms are replaced by only a few other atoms in a crystal, we consider the pure crystal to be "doped" by an impurity. When an atom containing more electrons replaces an atom in the pure crystal this is referred to as N-type doping, while replacing an atom in the pure crystal with an atom with fewer electrons is called P-type doping.

Despite their simplicity, there are still several drawbacks to utilizing photovoltaic cells, so chemists need to develop other methods to harness the sun's visible photons. In 1991 Dr. Michael Graetzel developed a new technology called a Gratzel, or dye sensitized solar cell, which is still being researched and developed today. The cells you are constructing in the lab are the exact ones Gratzel developed. On Friday, we will discuss the concepts behind these cells, which will include why we need to use a dye and why we need an electrolyte solution.

Lecture #25, Monday, March 1st

The main objective in today's lecture was to compare and contrast the differences we observe between a molecule and a solid. In molecules we have isolated units giving rise to discreet energy levels we observe in a molecular orbital diagram. In a solid the infinite number of atoms present leads to bands of molecule orbitals, which are wider in energy than the molecular orbitals in molecules.

Many of the physical properties of solids are dictated by the energy gap of the highest energy band containing electrons, which is referred to as the valence band, and the lowest energy band that does not contain electrons, or the conduction band.

The magnitude of the difference in energy between these two bands is referred to the band gap. Band gaps are typically reported in units of electron Volts (eV), so be sure to know how to convert from eV to Joules and vice versa.

As the bell rang I was discussing photovoltaic devices and what chemists can do to manipulate the band gap and design better materials with more desirable properties. We will pick up with that discussion on Wednesday.