CM3192 - PHYSICAL AND ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY EXPERIMENTS

Academic Year 23/24 - Semester 2

Assessments:​

• Lab Proforma: 44%

• Mini-viva: 8%

• Pre-labs: 8%

• Test: 40%

Lecturer: Dr Tan Wee Boon

Lab Instructor: Dr Tan Wee Boon & A/P Fan Wai Yip

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Course Overview: 

• Physical Chemistry:

  • Rovibrational spectroscopy of CO2

  • Liquid-vapour equilibrium of a binary mixture

  • Crystal structure analysis by powder x-ray diffraction

  • Au nanoparticles: synthesis, characterisation and stability studies

• Analytical Chemistry:

  • Emission studies : Fluorescence of Riboflavin and Inductively-Coupled Plasma Optical Emission Spectroscopy (ICP-OES) of Copper

  • Fluoride ion analysis using Ion-Selective Electrodes (ISE), Capillary Electrophoresis (CE) and Ion Chromatography (IC)

  • Hyphenated chromatography techniques : Identification of essential oils using Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) and  Quantification of a drug tablet using Liquid Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (LC-MS)

  • Isolation of carotenoids and their quantification using UV-Vis absorption spectroscopy

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No. of Responses: 2

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REVIEW

What advice would you give to someone considering to take this course?

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Flanders: This course has the highest workload out of all the core 3ks.  This course is divided into two halves: Physical chem, and Analytical chem. You will be alternating between the two every week. Each half will have 3 or 4 reports, one of which is a long report. There were only two F2F Analytical lectures. All the Physical chem lectures are videos.  Unlike CM3191, It is less important to take this course with friends. Every pair will be doing a different experiment each week. You will be doing the experiments in pairs (assigned alphabetically), same pair for the whole semester.  Every week is a different experiment, and you will be exposed to 1 or 2 new equipment every week. The average experiment involves preparing lots of samples, loading them into the instrument, and waiting for 2 hours while you do other things or have lunch. Most sessions end early, around 2pm. By the end of the course, you would have seen almost every instrument NUS owns.  However, you will not learn how to use the instruments, because all the settings are already done for you.  Every experiment's report is due two weeks from the experiment. There is a final exam comprising some theory aspects of the experiments you have done.

 

What did you enjoy or find most useful from this course?

 

Flanders: The instruments you see in CM3192 are very useful for internships in QC or Analytical companies. Unfortunately, you will only have around 5 minutes of experience in operating each instrument.

 

What aspects of the course did you find most challenging, and why?

 

Flanders: The high workload. Although most of the reports are pro-formas, it takes a long time to process the data. Also, it takes time to understand how the instruments work, so that you have something intelligent to write for your reports. It took me around 4 hours to do each pro-forma, and there is one every week.

 

What resources did you find most helpful in helping you better understand the course material?

 

Flanders: Your friends who have done the experiments before you.

 

What other courses do you think should be taken before or concurrently with this course?

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Flanders: Avoid other high workload courses especially CM3191.

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