GCTLC Library

Sustainability is an undeniably important issue that any educator who teaches green chemistry must at some point address. This collection of web resources is not only a great reference to aid in curriculum preparation, but it also briefly discusses some of the challenges that the world faces in light of limited resources and a growing population.

The review includes a short summary of green ...

This is an article published in J Chem Ed about a novel way to teach systems thinking in a non-majors chemistry course called "Perspectives on Plastic".

Authors: Marta Guron and Alexis Slentz
https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jchemed.1c00192

In this interactive, discussion-driven lesson, students explore the global problem of plastic pollution in the ocean and investigate how green chemistry and biomimicry can provide innovative solutions. Students examine the life cycle of plastics, identify common types of ocean plastic and microplastics, and discuss the limitations of recycling alone. The lesson culminates in a hands-on activity ...

This article describes a simple approach for measuring the octanol-water partition coefficient (Kow) of organic compounds using a simple miniature variation of the shake-flask method in an NMR tube, which can be quickly analyzed using a benchtop 1H NMR spectrometer. The article also details the scope and limitations of the method. Kow is an important metric for understanding bioaccumulation and ...

Coumarins represent an important class of natural and synthetic derivatives with interesting biological activities. The 3-carboxycoumarins have been intensely studied because new functionalities can be easily added via the carboxyl group. During this laboratory exercise, students prepare 7-hydroxy-3-carboxycoumarin using a one-pot, multi-step procedure in the absence of organic solvents. By using ...

This Learning Object explores a Green Chemistry approach to creating renewable, bio-based materials. Based on "One-step acrylation of soybean oil for the preparation of SO-based macromonomers" introduces an efficient, one-step method for acrylating soybean oil using acrylic acid and BF₃·Et₂O as a catalyst. The process avoids multi-step syntheses, enhances atom economy, and produces macromonomers ...

Orange is widely used in safety and warning contexts due to its high visibility. Traffic cones, life vests, and hazard signs feature orange to signal caution. It appears in construction zones, biohazard labels, and emergency signals. Its association with fire and urgency makes it a universal color for alertness and danger.
Although their colors may appear the same, the dyes and pigments used to ...

This module is part of a collection of nine green chemistry teaching modules developed in the early 2000s by a team of faculty (Donna Narsavage-Heald, Trudy Dickneider, David Marx, Timothy Foley, Joan Wasilewski) led by Michael Cann at the University of Scranton and has been migrated to the GCTLC. The subjects of the modules are based on winners of the Green Chemistry Challenge Awards. The modules ...

The lesson outlines for the second semester of organic chemistry (Klein, Organic Chemistry, 4th ed) contain lesson objectives, homework problems (H) and in-class problems (B) to engage students. Selected lessons feature "green" organic reactions specific to the chapter coverage.

This resource highlights how organic chemistry contributes to agriculture.

This is a discussion prompt where students find a molecule they use in a personal care product, cleaning product, or processed food. They find the structure, relate components of the name to aspects of the structure, look up the product on the Environmental Working Group (EWG) or FDA websites, and look up the molecule in PubChem. At the end, they need to decide whether they are happy with their ...

An organic chemistry laboratory experiment illustrating the oxidation of primary and secondary alcohols to their corresponding aldehyde or ketones, respectively, is described. The procedure uses 30% aqueous hydrogen peroxide in the presence of a tungsten catalyst (sodium tungstate) using phase transfer catalysis. The described experiments illustrate basic organic reaction chemistry and techniques ...

In this experiment, students perform a Grignard reaction under air-free conditions to synthesize and isolate organometallic Ni(II) phosphine complex(es) that are used as pre-catalysts for a Suzuki-Miyaura Coupling reaction in tert-amyl alcohol.

One of the main advantages of doing green chemistry is that it can often be done on the benchtop without the need for a fume-hood. In this experiment water and ethanol are the only solvents used for both the reaction and purification steps and oxone is a safe oxidant whose only by-product is potassium sulfate.

The oxidation of aromatic aldehydes using oxone allows instructors to discuss green ...

A new green oxidation procedure was developed for the undergraduate organic teaching laboratories using Oxone and a catalytic quantity of sodium chloride for the conversion of borneol to camphor. This simple 1 h, room temperature reaction afforded high quality and yield of product, was environmentally friendly, and produced negligible quantities of hazardous waste. The experiment was performed ...

Applications of organic chemistry to modify the structure and surface properties of materials are becoming increasingly important and interdisciplinary as the dimensions of modern materials decrease. This laboratory exercise illustrates how macroscopic material properties can be modified with self-assembled monolayers and organic thin-film patterning. Using an inexpensive gold on vinyl substrate ...

This module teaches fundamentals of pericyclic reactions using examples of biocatalysis, biomimetic catalysis, and natural product total synthesis. After completion, students should be able to identify key disconnections of pericyclic reactions (specifically [4+2] and [2+2] cycloadditions, as well as [3,3]-sigmatropic rearrangements) for the preparation of agrochemicals and natural products (SDG 2 ...

During Calendar Year 1999, the Illinois Waste Management and Research Center (WMRC), a state agency, and Argonne National Laboratory-East (Argonne), a federal research facility, jointly conducted a pilot project entitled "Chemical Waste Minimization in the Educational Laboratory." Four Chicago area secondary schools voluntarily participated in this Pilot Project. The purpose of the Pilot Project ...

This self-paced E-learning course aims to show the potentials for sustainable chemistry in the construction sector and to answer the following questions:

> How can plastics be used in a sustainable way in buildings?

> What obstacles are there and how can they be overcome?

> Which steps need to be followed, under consideration of regional differences?

> What are recommendations for ...

*This is lesson 1 of a 4-lesson unit. Green Chemistry technologies are serving as tools to capture the imagination of the next generation of problem solvers. This is a unit investigating biodiversity, food as science, and chemistry as a tool for solving sustainability challenges. The Plate to Planet Unit teaches students in grades 3-5 how food production and food decisions impact our environment ...

*This is lesson 2 of a 4-lesson unit. Green Chemistry technologies are serving as tools to capture the imagination of the next generation of problem solvers. This is a unit investigating biodiversity, food as science, and chemistry as a tool for solving sustainability challenges. The Plate to Planet Unit teaches students in grades 3-5 how food production and food decisions impact our environment ...

*This is lesson 3 of a 4-lesson unit. Green Chemistry technologies are serving as tools to capture the imagination of the next generation of problem solvers. This is a unit investigating biodiversity, food as science, and chemistry as a tool for solving sustainability challenges. The Plate to Planet Unit teaches students in grades 3-5 how food production and food decisions impact our environment ...

*This is lesson 4 of a 4-lesson unit. Green Chemistry technologies are serving as tools to capture the imagination of the next generation of problem solvers. This is a unit investigating biodiversity, food as science, and chemistry as a tool for solving sustainability challenges. The Plate to Planet Unit teaches students in grades 3-5 how food production and food decisions impact our environment ...

* This is an extension activity to the Plate to Planet Unit. This is an experiment/demonstration that is great for teaching about catalysts. The demonstration will show a chemical reaction in which a catalyst (yeast) is added to hydrogen peroxide to create a foam that looks like a giant squirt of toothpaste that could be used on an elephant!

*This is an extension activity to the Plate to Planet Unit. In this activity, the children will be extracting Deoxyribonucleic Acid, DNA, from strawberries. Cells are the basic unit of life and make up all living things. DNA is the molecule that controls everything in the cell. DNA contains the instructions that direct all the cell’s activities. This lesson will show how DNA can be isolated from ...

This is a political engagement activity designed for a 2nd year organic chemistry II lecture course. The activity engages the students in the review and summary of pending state legislation. After a class discussion about the content and goals of the bill, the class generates a list of questions they have about the bill. The students are then assigned/select questions to research and collect ...

This feature article, available through the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), gives an overview of indoor air pollutants and how chemists and scientists monitor and track them. The article highlights a massive study in June of 2018 that took place in the United States and provides a series of different activities for high school-level students to understand mass spectrometry. It also includes ...

This module is part of a collection of nine green chemistry teaching modules developed in the early 2000s by a team of faculty (Donna Narsavage-Heald, Trudy Dickneider, David Marx, Timothy Foley, Joan Wasilewski) led by Michael Cann at the University of Scranton and has been migrated to the GCTLC. The subjects of the modules are based on winners of the Green Chemistry Challenge Awards. The modules ...

The purpose of this lab is to introduce students to some basics of the chemistry of polymers. Polymer chemistry is often an afterthought in the General Chemistry curriculum, but polymers are very much present in students’ lives. The lab introduces the relationship between molecular structure (e.g., branched vs. linear, bulky vs small side groups) and bulk properties (e.g., flexibility). This lab ...

This case study explores the transesterification of triglycerides from soybean oil into a variety of vinyl monomers - soy-based acrylic monomers (SBAs). This transesterification uses commercially available N-(hydroxyethyl)acrylamide as a reactant, was carried out in one synthetic step, ran at room temperature (minimizing energy use), and used only a catalytic amount of sodium hydroxide. These ...

In this laboratory experiment, students will perform a hazard assessment for different hydrates and rank them according to their human and environmental hazards. Students will also determine the percent water in an unknown hydrate and use that information to determine the formula of a hydrate.

This learning object explores the preparation and characterization of lubricant basestocks synthesized from epoxidized soybean oil (ESO) and 2-ethylhexanol (2-EH). The study investigates the reaction pathways—primarily epoxy ring-opening and transesterification—using different catalysts, and evaluates the resulting products in terms of viscosity, pour point, viscosity index, and oxidative ...

The purpose of this lab is to give students experience in the practical preparation of buffers and exploring buffer properties. Students will prepare aqueous solutions with specific concentrations of acids and bases, and use pH meters to examine the pH of these buffers. The buffer capacity of the prepared buffers will also be measured.

Featuring contributions from Tamara Fitzjarrald.

This learning object examines the development of environmentally friendly pressure-sensitive adhesives (PSAs) synthesized from epoxidized soybean oil (ESO) and bio-based dicarboxylic acids via an epoxide–acid reaction. The study investigates the influence of crosslinking density, monomer ratios, and curing conditions on adhesive performance, including tack, peel strength, and shear resistance. The ...

This resource has been developed through a collaboration of Beyond Benign, MilliporeSigma, My Green Lab, and a network of chemistry faculty. Green Chemistry: Principles and Lab Practices is an introductory primer for the Guide to Green Chemistry Experiments for Undergraduate Organic Chemistry Labs*, and contains a variety of resources, tools, and references for practicing green chemistry in ...

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

Learn the twelve principles of green chemistry taught during The Green Chemistry & Engineering Student Workshop on June 17, 2013 in Washington D.C. The course content was provided by ACS-GCI. These videos were produced by the Western States Pollution Prevention Network. Other sponsors included NPPR and Washington State Department of Ecology.

This activity is focused on the Engineering Design Process. In the activity, students apply what they have learned about the engineering design process to a real-life problem that affects them and/or their school. They choose a problem as a group, and then follow the engineering design process to come up with and test their design solution. This activity teaches students how to use the engineering ...