Roosevelt Academy Middelburg - Science

SCI 222 Physical Chemistry

Content

This course will focus on the three main areas within the field of Physical Chemistry. The first part of the course focuses on Quantum Mechanics. It reviews Quantum Mechanics as discussed in SCI 121: the particle-in-a-box problem and the harmonic oscillator will be discussed. We will have again a look at the solution of the Schrodinger Equation for the Hydrogen atom. The Schrodinger Equation cannot be solved exactly in the case of multielectron atoms. This course will discuss two approximation methods; perturbation theory and the variational method. These techniques allow for a quantum mechanical discussion on electronic wave functions, atomic wave functions and molecular orbital wave functions. Finally, we will discuss chemical bonding and the bonding in polyatomic molecules. The second part of the course will present a thorough discussion on thermodynamics. This part of the course starts with a discussion on the properties of gases. It will discuss partition functions and statistical thermodynamics. All macroscopic quantities such as pressure and temperature arise from molecular properties. The course continues with the laws of thermodynamics; heat, pressure-volume work, internal energy; entropy and enthalpy. Finally, we will discuss how absolute entropies can be calculated from tabulated heat capacities. The last subject is the kinetic theory of gases. Finally, the course discusses Chemical Kinetics: Rate laws describe the time dependency of a chemical reaction. We will discuss how rate laws can be determined experimentally, and how we can distinguish between different reaction mechanisms.