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General Chemistry for Engineers in the 21st Century: A Materials Science Approach

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Abstract

In the case of General Chemistry, many engineering students only take a one semester class with important topics such as kinetics and equilibrium being given limited coverage. Considerable time is spent covering materials already covered in other courses such as General Physics and Introduction to Engineering. Moreover, most GChem courses are oriented toward health science majors and lack a materials focus relevant to engineering. Taking an atoms first approach, we developed and now run a one-semester course in general chemistry for engineers emphasizing relevant materials topics. Laboratory exercises integrate practical examples of materials science enriching the course for engineering students. First-semester calculus and a calculus-based introduction to engineering course are prerequisites, which enables teaching almost all the topics from a traditional two semester GChem course in this new course with advance topics as well. To support this course, an open access textbook in LibreText, formerly ChemWiki was developed entitled General Chemistry for Engineering. Many of the topics were supported using Chemical Excelets and Materials Science Excelets, which are interactive Excel/Calc spreadsheets. The laboratory includes data analysis and interpretation, calibration, error analysis, reactions, kinetics, electrochemistry, and spectrophotometry. To acquaint the students with online collaboration typical of today’s technical workplace Google Drive was used for data analysis and report preparation in the laboratory.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Physical Sciences & Engineering, Prince George’s Community College, Largo, 20774, MD, USA

    Scott A. Sinex & Scott D. Johnson

  2. Chemistry, Howard University, Washington, 20059, DC, USA

    Joshua B. Halpern

Authors
  1. Scott A. Sinex
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  2. Joshua B. Halpern
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  3. Scott D. Johnson
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Sinex, S.A., Halpern, J.B. & Johnson, S.D. General Chemistry for Engineers in the 21st Century: A Materials Science Approach. MRS Advances 2, 1629–1634 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1557/adv.2017.40

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