Department of Physical Sciences

Department of Chemistry and Geosciences

Chemistry 4861 Literature Problems Course Syllabus Fall 2011

Objective

The objective of this course is for the student to present an oral presentation of about 20 minutes and write a written report based on some recent research topic contained in the literature. This course is intended to give the student some experience in how to search the current literature and get practice in reading journal articles and interpreting what the articles are stating.

Procedure

You will be giving a oral presentation at the end of the semester on a recent article from the current literature. You will make a choice among a number of journal articles. I currently have a list of 16 different journal articles in different areas of chemistry. Each student will have to do choose a different article. It will be first-come, first-served as to availability of journal articles. The journal articles will be posted on my website under to heading of “literature problems”. You need to make your decision by January 30^th. During the time period from Feb. 1^st through Mar. 1^st , you will need to come to my office so we can perform a SciFinder search on the research area that the article covers. The presentations will be held on Thursday, April 26^th in the afternoon. You need to write an abstract of your talk and hand that in to me by April 19^th. You will also need to write a written report about the research topic presented in the journal. This written report will be due on May 2^nd. In addition, during the month of April, you will have to come in and take a major field exam in Chemistry. This exam is administered online and is given in two parts, each one is an hour long. You can take both parts together or each on separate days.

To reiterate the due dates for this course:

Jan 30^th : Choice of research topic.

Feb. 1-Mar. 1: Schedule a time with Dr. Low to perform a SciFinder search.

April: Take the major field exam

April 19: A written abstract of your talk is due to me.

April 26: Talks are scheduled

May 2: Written report is due.

Failure to follow these deadlines will adversely affect your final grade in this course. Remember that both the oral presentation and written report are required to be turned in to be able to pass this course.