Synthesis Explorer: Dynamically generated reaction and synthesis problems for organic chemistry education

CHED 1792

Jonathan H. Chen, chenjh@uci.edu1, Peter Phung2, and Pierre Baldi, pfbaldi@uci.edu1. (1) Institute for Genomics and Bioinformatics, School of Information and Computer Sciences, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697, (2) Department of Information & Computer Sciences, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92612
One of the most challenging skills to acquire in organic chemistry is the ability to solve multi-step synthesis problems using basic knowledge of chemical reagents. Acquisition of this skill requires extensive practice. Here we present an online expert system that allows students to train themselves against a battery of product prediction and retrosynthesis problems. Unlike other systems relying on a database of preconstructed problems, our system relies on a collection of chemical reagent models with a built in understanding of reactivity. This built in knowledge provides the unique capability for dynamically generating new problems at will. Furthermore, it allows students to deviate from the "correct" synthesis path and explore alternative, potentially original, paths and products. The predictive power of the system encourages students to learn through practice and experimentation with essentially unlimited "replay" value. The system is available at http://cdb.ics.uci.edu.
 

Applications of Electronic Homework Systems
8:00 AM-11:45 AM, Thursday, March 29, 2007 McCormick Place North -- Room N229, Level 2, Oral

Division of Chemical Education

The 233rd ACS National Meeting, Chicago, IL, March 25-29, 2007