CHEM 29A — Organic Chemistry Laboratory I
Chemistry 29A is the first of two laboratory courses in organic chemistry, and as such it is primarily concerned with introducing the tools and techniques that chemists use to investigate the nature of organic compounds. Students will learn a variety of isolation and purification techniques such as recrystallization, liquid-liquid extraction, distillation (simple, fractional, steam), and chromatography (solid and gas phase). Students will also synthesize organic compounds and characterize their purified products using melting point determination and FTIR analysis. Gas chromatography, boiling point, refractometry, polarimetry, and NMR will also be utilized in this course.