This project uses an FT-NMR, upgraded from a CW-NMR, in general chemistry, organic chemistry, and instrumental analysis courses within the undergraduate chemistry curriculum. Laboratories designed for the FT-NMR enable our students to expand their knowledge base from learning concepts to solving problems through the application of modem instrumentation. We develop our students' analytical and instrumentation skills by the introduction of project-based laboratories into the curriculum. The project-based laboratories are developed by adapting well-known reactions from the undergraduate education literature or from the primary research literature. These laboratories are designed to introduce students to the scientific method and the means by which it is developed. In these labs, students construct their own hypotheses and testable experiments, collect and interpret data and disseminate the information through discussions and presentations. The upgrade to the FT-NMR enables our students to follow kinetic reactions, investigate equilibrium reactions and obtain integrated spectra necessary in the project-based labs. A secondary goal is to modernize the undergraduate curriculum and to produce graduates who are competent in the use of modern instrumentation. The NMR is also used in undergraduate research projects.
