The Chemistry Faculty members are implementing an environmental focus to the curriculum. This focus is a natural progression based on the institution's ecologically diverse location and the students' employment record in environmental sciences. To achieve this focus, suitable instrumentation is being used to develop novel environmental experiments to promote student learning in (1) the identification of synthesized and natural compounds, (2) monitoring compounds and their degradation in the environment, and (3) analytical method development. Gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC-MS) is a powerful technique used to facilitate this kind of learning and is also widely used in environmental analysis. Using environmental applications, a benchtop GC-MS instrument is being integrated into the curriculum. The first objective is being met by GC-MS characterization of natural products and an environmentally benign chemical synthesis (green chemistry) involving a dye-sensitized irradiation. GC-MS is also being employed to research carbonyl compounds as thiazolidine derivatives in cigarette smoke. In a new environmental chemistry course, kinetic factors in compound degradation can be illustrated by monitoring the degradation of insect pheromones and organophosphate pesticides by GC-MS. GC-MS is being employed to illustrate analytical method development by the identification and determination of volatiles in samples.
