NMR in Undergrad Curricula

The following responses were received when I inquired about how and when NMR experiments are incorporated in undergraduate education. I want to thank all those who responded, and I encourage YOU to send a summary of NMR in your undergradaute curriculum to chemnmr@indiana.edui.
NMR instruction should be part of analytical, organic, and inorganic, chemistries, but not necessarily physical chemistry. For Jr. year course in applied spectroscopy for analytical chemists, students are given unknowns to solve. Organic and inorganic students characterize synthesis products in their labs, which include NMR spectra.

Jack Martin Miller
jmiller@sandcastle.cosc.brocku.ca
http://chemiris.labs.brocku.ca/staff/miller/miller.html

Sophmore qualitative organic chemistry laboratory students and Instrumental Analysis Laboratory students receive a (NMR) spectrum of their unknown compound. Spectra for the qualitative analysis course are taken with an automated sample changer, but advanced undergraduates may acquire their own spectra. Students enrolled in the Physical Chemistry Laboratory find the equilibrium constant for a keto-enol tautomerism using NMR. Polymer Laboratory students find the tacticity of a polymer.

(The students) probably should have the exposure to the instrument, which is better facilitated by a specialist in NMR. During the 1970's Varian used to distribute a list of experiments to their customers with a EM390. This list will get you thinking about a variety of chemical systems and so I think it is a good place to start.

John West
west@qtp.ufl.edu

UNM plans to incorporate NMR into
  1. freshman honours lab: NMR of water, methanol, and ethanol
  2. 2nd semester sophmore organic lab: DEPT of cholesterol acetate
  3. Jr level inorganic lab: complex formation
  4. upper level organic/inorganic/pchem lab: DEPT + other expts.
  5. upper level instrumentation lab
Karen Ann Smith
karenann@unm.edu
NMR _is_ "multidisciplinary", any way that you look at it. You could even include NMR in physics, electrical engineering, and even computer science departments to some extent. It is a shame though, that in many schools, only organic chemists get any real exposure to that technique. Physical and analytical students would benefit to exposure to NMR, IMHO.

George D. Sukenick, Ph.D.
g-sukenick@ski.mskcc.org

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Last updated: April 2nd, 1998
URL: http://nmr.chem.indiana.edu/NMR_instruct/curriculum.html
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