9354596 Keeffe The project will develop molecular modelling/computational chemistry experiments for use in first-year organic chemistry courses. Computational chemistry, rapidly becoming an almost routine tool for academic and industrial chemists, offers an unusually good opportunity for students to investigate efficiently a variety of molecular attributes including conformational stability, preferred bond angles and lengths, energies of reaction, and reaction pathways. Results can provide rationalization of known data, or predictions subject to verification. These benefits will accrue only with the aid of a high quality, integrated visualization environment, a feature central to our proposal. These experiments will be introduced as hands-on exercises to our organic lab students: 240-280 students per year, including chemistry and biochemistry majors and most pre-health profession students. Our ca. 500 organic lecture students each year will be shown the results - both numerical and pictorial - of a variety of pertinent computations. This group of students includes all of our biology majors and those training for precollege science teaching careers. ***y
