A Day in the Life: Characterization of Doctoral Bench Research in Synthetic Chemistry Using Phenomenological Case Studies.

Despite decades of reform efforts, STEM education continues to face calls for improvement, especially regarding the teaching laboratory. Establishing an empirical understanding of the types of hands-on, psychomotor skills that students need to learn to succeed in downstream careers could help ensure laboratory courses are promoting authentic learning. Therefore, this paper reports phenomenological grounded theory case studies characterizing the nature of benchwork in synthetic organic chemistry graduate research. Through first-person video data and retrospective interviews, the results illustrate how organic chemistry students use psychomotor skills to conduct doctoral research and where they acquired those skills. By understanding the role that psychomotor skills play in authentic benchwork and the role that teaching laboratories play in the development of those skills, chemical educators could revolutionize undergraduate laboratory experiences by enabling evidence-based incorporation of the psychomotor component into laboratory learning objectives.

LAB Theory, HLAB Pedagogy, and Review of Laboratory Learning in Chemistry during the COVID-19 Pandemic.

The role and efficacy of the laboratory in chemical education have recently been a subject of renewed discussion as researchers are called upon to address the question of whether laboratory education lives up to expectations. The COVID-19 pandemic, which forced most of the global student population to temporarily adopt remote learning, offers an unparalleled case study to investigate types of outcomes resulting from a variety of adjustments made to laboratory education. This scoping review article focuses on the reports of laboratory learning in chemistry and closely related disciplines during COVID-19 to analyze the types of adjustments made to laboratory curricula and the immediate effect of these adjustments on students. The aggregated findings suggest that a lack of hands-on laboratory experience was detrimental to certain types of learning and engagement but that other types of learning were successfully achieved remotely. For researchers, departments, and university administrators, the differentiation in these findings could help inform the ongoing discussion about the future of laboratory education. For instructors and student support staff, the findings indicate potential areas of deficiency and strength for the COVID-19 student cohort going forward. Finally, a laboratory learning theory and pedagogy are proposed to guide the use of the laboratory in chemical education and potentially in other laboratory-based sciences as well.

Synthesis of monoalkylidene diketopiperazines and application to the synthesis of barettin.

The synthesis of barettin, a selective serotonin receptor inhibitor and potent antibiofouling natural product, is described. The synthesis starts with the diketopiperazine nucleus intact and the side chains are installed using iterative aldol condensations. The route represents a general strategy for synthesis of a wide array of mono-alkylidene diketopiperazine structures, including those derived from non-canonical amino acid residues.