Introduction of Fourier Transform Infrared (FT-IR) instrumentation and analysis have great educational benefits for both non-science- and science majors. All students need to have a realistic awareness of the potential and limitations of at least some of the technologies that underlie current scientific research. Since non-science-majors may take as few as one formal science course during their 4 years as an undergraduate, it is critical that institutions provide them with exposure to chemical technologies relevant to their future. Science majors additionally need an early introduction and continued exposure to modern instrumentation since usage of such instrumentation is the norm in the scientific research community. The university has chosen FT-IR instrumentation as a way of addressing these broad educational goals for all introductory chemistry classes. Non-science-majors learn how infrared spectroscopy may be used for chemical identification in the context of environmental and pharmaceutical applications. Science majors strengthen their understanding of principles of bonding and molecular structure through FT-IR. Students are also shown how spectroscopy is the result of bonding phenomena and, conversely, how the interpretation of spectroscopic phenomena yields information about bonding and structure. Furthermore, students learn quantitative applications of FT-IR so they may apply this technique to both qualitative and quantitative tasks of analysis.
