Ngee-Sing Chong & Judith Gross

nchong@mtsu.edu

Tom Cheatham

CBAS

Discipline specific equipment

DSB 104, 206. 227, 240

New Technology

N/A

The acquisition of new laboratory equipment and upgrading of existing instruments will have a profound educational impact on students in the chemistry department and the environmental science and technology (ES&T) program in the ETIS department. This proposal aims to improve the instructional resources for courses such as Detection of Chemical Pollutants, Environmental Chemistry, Atmospheric Chemistry, Organic Chemistry I & II, and Biochemistry I & II. It will enhance the training of students planning to join the workforce in the environmental fields and support the chemistry program at both undergraduate and graduate levels, including the D.A. program that is being revamped for Ph. D. conversion. The proposal will boost the fledgling mobile laboratory initiative at MTSU by adding new capabilities in the analysis of pollutants in air, water, soil, and hazardous waste. The DR/4000 and DR/2500 spectrophotometers allow about 120 types of chemical analysis to be carried out for laboratory and field analyses, respectively. The pre-packaged test kits and the pre-programmed analytical parameters enable efficient laboratory experiments to be designed for the 150-minute lab periods without going over the time limits of class schedules. Furthermore, it prevents the excessive generation of hazardous wastes that require disposal costs. The Empore solid phase extraction system allows 6 samples to be processed simultaneously so that excellent detection limits can be achieved and the contamination of expensive instruments by "dirty" environmental samples can be minimized. The data system for GC will replace the obsolete GC integrators that provide hardcopy output of analytical results. The data system will allow students to save files for later analysis or re-process the data in order to increase productivity in the class and research projects. The two GC detectors and the infrared spectrometer will allow the state-of-the-art environmental techniques to be introduced to students in both chemistry and the ES&T program. Hands on equipment for Physical Science labs will facilitate student's learning to think independently and critically, collect and analyze information, work as a team member, and communicate results. In addition they will be able to read and understand current science in the news and thus how science plays a role in the global community.