Practical Skills in Chemistry

Citation

Dean, J. R., Langford, A. M., Holmes, D. A., Reed, R., Weyers, J., & Jones, A. (2017). Practical Skills in Chemistry (3rd ed.). Pearson.

Chapter Summary

The book is a one-volume skills guide of about 656 pages. The publisher's contents list gives 67 chapters, averaging about ten pages each, grouped into nine topic areas, with titles only. The publisher describes it as guidance for use in and out of practical sessions, from the first day of a degree to graduation, covering practical, analytical and data-handling skills together with transferable skills such as teamwork, information technology, communication and study skills.

Chapters 1–7: Study and examination skills

The importance of transferable skills; Managing your time; Working with others; Taking notes from lectures and texts; Learning and revising; Curriculum options, assessments and exams; Preparing your curriculum vitae. These chapters deal with the general skills of being a student, from time management and teamwork to assessments and preparing a CV.

Chapters 8–13: Information technology and library resources

Finding and citing published information; Evaluating information; Using online resources; Internet resources for chemistry; Using spreadsheets; Word processors, databases and other packages. Literature searching, referencing and judging sources, followed by the software tools students use for data and writing.

Chapters 14–19: Communicating information

Organising a poster display; Giving a spoken presentation; General aspects of scientific writing; Writing essays; Reporting practical and project work; Writing literature surveys and reviews. A group on the forms of scientific communication, including the laboratory and project report.

Chapters 20–26: Fundamental laboratory techniques

Your approach to practical work; Health and safety; Working with liquids; Basic laboratory procedures I; Basic laboratory procedures II; Principles of solution chemistry; pH and buffer solutions. The group that a first-year laboratory course draws on most, from attitude to practical work and safety through handling liquids to solution preparation, pH and buffers.

Chapters 27–30: The investigative approach

Making and recording measurements; SI units and their use; Scientific method and design of experiments; Project work. Measurement and recording, units, experimental design and the running of projects.

Chapters 31–38: Laboratory techniques

Melting points; Recrystallisation; Solvent extraction; Distillation; Reflux; Evaporation; Inert atmosphere methods; Combinatorial chemistry. Techniques used in preparative organic and inorganic chemistry, from purification and isolation to work under an inert atmosphere.

Chapters 39–45: Classical techniques

Qualitative techniques for inorganic analysis; Gravimetry; Procedures in volumetric analysis; Acid–base titrations; Complexometric titrations; Redox titrations; Precipitation titrations. The wet-chemical methods of analysis, with one chapter on volumetric procedure followed by the main titration types.

Chapters 46–59: Instrumental techniques

Fundamental principles of quantitative chemical analysis; Calibration and quantitative analysis; Basic spectroscopy; Atomic spectroscopy; X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy; Chromatography – basic principles; Gas and liquid chromatography; Electrophoresis; Electroanalytical techniques; Radioactive isotopes and their uses; Infrared spectroscopy; Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy; Mass spectrometry; Thermal analysis. The two opening chapters set out principles and calibration; the others take the main instrumental methods in turn. The publisher lists updated treatment of Raman spectroscopy in this edition without naming the chapter.

Chapters 60–67: Analysis and presentation of data

Using graphs; Presenting data in tables; Hints for solving numerical problems; Descriptive statistics; Choosing and using statistical tests; Drawing chemical structures; Chemometrics; Computational chemistry. Handling numbers and presenting them, statistics, and two more specialised topics at the end.

Key Concepts

Chapters 1–19: Study, information and communication

• Transferable skills: the general skills (teamwork, time management, information technology, communication) that the book treats alongside chemistry (Chapter 1).
• Evaluating information: judging published and online sources (Chapter 9).
• Reporting practical and project work: how practical and project work is written up (Chapter 18).

Chapters 20–45: Laboratory practice and classical analysis

• Health and safety: the approach to safe working in the laboratory (Chapter 21).
• Experimental design and project work: scientific method and the planning of experiments (Chapters 29–30).
• Preparative techniques: recrystallisation, solvent extraction, distillation, reflux and inert atmosphere methods (Chapters 32–37).
• Volumetric analysis: titrations of the acid–base, complexometric, redox and precipitation types (Chapters 41–45).

Chapters 46–67: Instrumental analysis and data

• Calibration and quantitative analysis: the principles that underlie quantitative instrumental work (Chapters 46–47).
• Spectroscopic, chromatographic and electroanalytical techniques: the main instrumental methods (Chapters 48–59).
• Descriptive statistics and statistical tests: summarising data and choosing and using tests (Chapters 63–64).
• Chemometrics and computational chemistry: advanced data and modelling topics (Chapters 66–67).

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• A wide range of degree skills in one place. The contents run from study skills and writing, through safety and basic laboratory procedures, preparative and classical techniques and instrumental methods, to statistics and computing. A student can use one book from the first practical session to the final-year project.
• Short, modular chapters. Sixty-seven chapters grouped into nine topics make it easy to look up one technique or skill at a time; the publisher also lists margin tips and hints, "how to" boxes, checklists, worked examples and study exercises throughout.
• Numerical and data skills are given space. Eight chapters at the end cover graphs, tables, numerical problem solving, descriptive statistics, statistical tests, chemometrics and computational chemistry, and the publisher highlights guidance on numerical aspects, including statistics.
• Skills beyond the bench. Chapters on time management, teamwork, finding and citing information, giving presentations and preparing a CV treat communication and employability as part of the practical skill set.
• Software guidance kept general. According to the publisher, the third edition gives generic guidance on Microsoft Office software instead of version-specific details, which helps it age more slowly.

Limitations

• Breadth before depth. With 67 chapters in about 656 pages, each topic is brief. Preparative chemistry has eight chapters and inert-atmosphere methods one, so work such as multi-step synthesis or air-sensitive chemistry needs a specialist laboratory text.
• Safety is one chapter in a wider book. Health and safety is a single chapter among 67, so a course with serious hazard exposure should add a dedicated safety text or the institution's own procedures.
• Online-resource chapters date quickly. Chapters on online resources and internet resources for chemistry describe a fast-changing landscape, and the edition appeared in 2017.
• A guide to practice rather than a theory text. The publisher presents the book as practical guidance, so the theory behind the instrumental and classical methods is likely to need a lecture course or a full analytical or spectroscopy textbook.

Where It Fits in the Course

Practical Skills in Chemistry is the broadest book among the laboratory practice books on this list: it is aimed at every undergraduate from the first practical class. Hill and Finster's Laboratory Safety for Chemistry Students is described as a safety textbook graded by year of study, making it the dedicated companion to the single health and safety chapter here, and the National Research Council's Prudent Practices in the Laboratory is the reference on laboratory chemical hazards, management, waste and facilities.

For synthetic work beyond the teaching laboratory, Leonard, Lygo and Procter's Advanced Practical Organic Chemistry is aimed at students moving from teaching laboratories to research, and Shriver and Drezdzon's The Manipulation of Air-Sensitive Compounds is a specialist monograph on inert-atmosphere equipment and procedure that extends the single inert atmosphere chapter in Practical Skills.

How to Use This Book

The book is intended to be used from the first laboratory class onward; the publisher presents it as a guide for the whole degree, starting from the first day, and lists no prerequisites.

A practical plan:

• First year: the fundamental laboratory techniques (Chapters 20–26), measurement and units (27–28), the report-writing chapters (16 and 18), and the data chapters on graphs, tables and descriptive statistics (60–63). Read Chapter 21 before the first practical, and the study-skills chapters (1–7) in the first weeks.
• Second and third years: the preparative techniques (31–38), the classical methods (39–45) and the instrumental chapters (46–59) as the course introduces each method; use Chapters 46–47 as the common starting point for any instrumental chapter.
• Final year and project work: experimental design and project work (29–30), literature surveys (19), statistical tests, chemometrics and computational chemistry (64, 66–67), and the CV chapter (7) when applying for jobs.

Treat it as a reference: read the relevant chapter before a practical, use the checklists and how-to boxes while working, and return to the data chapters when writing up results.