{"id":1819,"date":"2013-01-25T12:48:28","date_gmt":"2013-01-25T20:48:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/?p=1819"},"modified":"2014-03-18T10:14:49","modified_gmt":"2014-03-18T17:14:49","slug":"can-a-picture-tell-you-whether-a-molecule-is-polar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/2013\/01\/can-a-picture-tell-you-whether-a-molecule-is-polar\/","title":{"rendered":"Can a picture tell you whether a molecule is polar?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This question is asked in a particularly interesting way by <strong>G.E. H\u00f6st et al<\/strong> in the December issue of J. Chem. Ed. (<strong>&#8220;Students&#8217; Use of Three Different Visual Representations to Interpret Whether Molecules are Polar or Nonpolar&#8221;<\/strong>, <strong>DOI: <a title=\"Journal of Chemical Education, 2012, p. 1499\" href=\"http:\/\/dx.doi.org\/10.1021\/ed2001895\" target=\"_blank\">10.1021\/ed2001895<\/a><\/strong>). They presented students with three types of pictures:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>positive and negative isopotential surfaces rendered in blue and red (RB)<\/li>\n<li>an electrostatic potential map on an isodensity surface (MAP)<\/li>\n<li>an isopotential surface for the node in potential, i.e., the surface(s) that separate regions of positive and negative potential (ISO)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>and they correlated student performance, i.e., whether a student could correctly say whether a molecule was polar or nonpolar, and how long it took for them to reach that decision, with the type of picture. Here are ISO and MAP pictures of <em>trans<\/em>-1,2-dichloroethene:<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1821\" style=\"width: 160px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/files\/2013\/01\/ISO_trans_12-dichloroethene.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1821\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-1821\" alt=\"ISO E-ClCH=CHCl\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/files\/2013\/01\/ISO_trans_12-dichloroethene-150x150.png\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-1821\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">ISO picture<br \/>trans-1,2-dichloroethene<br \/>EDF1\/6-31G*<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"attachment_1822\" style=\"width: 160px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/files\/2013\/01\/MAP_trans_12-dichloroethene.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1822\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-1822\" alt=\"MAP E-ClCH=CHCl\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/files\/2013\/01\/MAP_trans_12-dichloroethene-150x150.png\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-1822\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">MAP picture<br \/>trans-1,2-dichloroethene<br \/>EDF1\/6-31G*<\/p><\/div>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this project is the innovative thinking that went into finding pictures (RB, MAP, ISO) that might be useful to students. I had never considered the properties or utility of the zero potential (ISO) surface myself.<\/p>\n<p>I hope this article will inspire more teachers to consider the variety of pictures that can be generated and also the powerful impact they can have.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This question is asked in a particularly interesting way by G.E. H\u00f6st et al in the December issue of J. Chem. Ed. (&#8220;Students&#8217; Use of Three Different Visual Representations to Interpret Whether Molecules are Polar or Nonpolar&#8221;, DOI: 10.1021\/ed2001895). They&nbsp;&hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/2013\/01\/can-a-picture-tell-you-whether-a-molecule-is-polar\/\">finish&nbsp;reading&nbsp;Can a picture tell you whether a molecule is polar?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reading-light"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1819"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1819\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1824,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1819\/revisions\/1824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/shusterman_lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}