Analytical Chemistry Educational Research (Using LabVIEW)
Since 1960 I have been a part of three experiments to use teams and small groups for both teaching and research at the graduate and undergraduate level in the analytical academic environment. The first occurred in the graduate analytical spectroscopy course at the University of Illinois from 1960 to 1965, as taught then by Howard Malmstadt. This experiment showed how successful a team effort could be, and some things that could diminish that success. The second occurred in my research program at the University of Wisconsin from 1965 to 1982. This experiment showed how interchangeable parts in research collaborations could produce dramatic success in solving difficult problems, and how confusion between thinking independently while acting interdependently could diminish it. The third experiment covers my work at St. Olaf College from 1982 to 1997. This experiment shows how Role-Playing works to produce enhanced ownership of results, diminishment of the class/lab metaphorical split, and huge improvements in student morale. It also shows the importance of division of responsibility, as opposed to division of labor, and the criticality of role rotation.
Probably the one analytical chemistry lab experiment that has been a continual part of my career, going back to my early days at the Unversity of Wisconsin while teaching the Chemistry 221 lab, has been the "Weak Acid Titration". Above is the LabVIEW® VI panel implementation of that titration showing the way in which the experimental and theoretical data and titration parameters can be overlaid. The small squares are experimental data; the white line through them is a theoretical plot using the parameters shown at the left. LabVIEW® is a marvelous environment for presenting graphical data and doing "what if" studies of changes in experimental parameters on it. Here, for example, students deduce the effects of pK's on the titration curve while looking for cause/effect trends.
This experiment works so well because of the contributions Professor John Wright (now departmental chair of UW-Chemistry) made to its development in 1977 at Wisconsin. He was the first to realize that making pAH the independent variable, and then calculating as the dependent variable how much base had to be added to achieve that particular pAH, eliminated the need for approximation formulas that had to be changed for each titration region. He also was the first to incorporate activity corrections into the stoichiometric equations. This allowed me to eventually make the VI diagram shown below and accomplish the close agreement between theory and experiment shown above. John is not only a very bright researcher, he is also a good friend, an effective administrator, and an outstanding teacher.
I do LabVIEW VI's like this from scratch, or as part of a team collaboration. I love building VI's!
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