Courses

The listing of a course description here does not guarantee a course’s being offered in a particular term. Please refer to the published schedule of classes on the MyBU Student Portal for confirmation a class is actually being taught and for specific course meeting dates and times.

• CAS CH 623: Chemical Biology
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: (GRSCH621) (GRSCH622 recommended), or consent of instructor. - Research at the chemistry-biology interface, including directed evolution, unnatural amino acid mutagenesis, chemical genetics, proteomics, and fluorescent reporters of enzyme function. Reading, discussing and evaluating the current chemical biology literature is a significant component of the course.
• CAS CH 624: Macromolecular Structure Determination
  Graduate Prerequisites: CH/BI 421; or equivalent, or consent of instructor - This course covers the determination of structures of biological macromolecules including RNA, DNA, and proteins. Topics include macromolecular assemblies and symmetry, crystal forms, diffraction, phase determination, data acquisition, model building and refinement, model analysis and homology modeling.
• CAS CH 625: Enzymology: Mechanisms of Enzymatic Reactions
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: (CASCH421) or equivalent, or consent of instructor. - Covers enzyme structure-function relationships. A tool-box of methods is presented, including kinetics (steady state and pre-steady state methods), isotope effects, stereo-chemical methods, site-directed mutagenesis, methods to replace natural with unnatural amino acids, mechanism based inhibitors.
• CAS CH 628: Protein Chemistry
  Graduate Prerequisites: (GRSCH621) or equivalent, or consent of instructor. - The structure and function of selected enzymes, motor/pump proteins, and structural protein assemblies, highlighting concepts in macromolecular structure analysis, including linking structure and dynamics to catalysis. Analysis of selected primary literature underscoring structural underpinnings via molecular graphics.
• CAS CH 631: Advanced Coordination Chemistry I: Structure and Bonding
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: (CASCH232) or equivalent, or consent of instructor. - The interdependence of chemical bonding, spectroscopic characteristics, and reactivity properties of coordination compounds and complexes are described and formalized using the fundamental concept of symmetry, as applied to inorganic coordination complexes.
• CAS CH 632: Advanced Coordination Chemistry II: Inorganic Reaction Mechanisms
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: (CASCH232 & CASCH214) or consent of instructor. - The mechanistic study of ligand substitution and electron transfer processes in coordination compounds are discussed in the context of basic molecular orbital theory. The connections between small molecule inorganic and biological macromolecular metal-catalyzed processes are presented.
• CAS CH 633: Physical Methods for Inorganic and Bioinorganic Chemistry
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: ((CASCH 232 & CASCH 352) OR GRSCH 631) or equivalents, or consent of instructor. - A discussion of the physical techniques for the study of structural, magnetic, and redox-active properties of transitional metal complexes. Techniques discussed include x-ray crystallography; x-ray absorption; vibrational, NMR, EPR, and Mossbauer spectroscopies; and electrochemistry.
• CAS CH 634: Metallobiochemistry
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: (CASCH232 & CASCH421) or equivalents, or consent of instructor. - The roles of transition metals in biology are assessed by review of the structural, spectroscopic, and genetic aspects of metallobiochemistry. Metal import and trafficking; cofactor biogenesis; biocatalytic transformations in biochemistry; reactive oxygen species; the inorganic basis of life.
• CAS CH 635: Synthetic Methodology in Inorganic Chemistry
  Graduate Prerequisites: (CASCH232) or equivalent. - The descriptive chemistries of the metallic elements are surveyed to develop a broad knowledge of these elements and how to prepare their compounds and understand the resultant reactivities. Case studies are taken from older and recent literature sources.
• CAS CH 636: Organometallic Catalysis
  This course provides a survey of pertinent topics in catalysis, focusing on organometallic complexes as the catalyst along with their kinetic and mechanistic analysis. The course covers catalytic reactions spanning those of major industrial importance to novel academic interest.
• CAS CH 641: Physical Organic Chemistry
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: (CASCH352) or equivalent or consent of instructor. - Physical fundamentals of organic chemistry. Thermodynamics, kinetics, molecular orbital theory, and theory of concerted reactions. Isotope effects, aromaticity, linear free energy relationships, acidity functions, photo- and free-radical chemistry.
• CAS CH 642: Organic Reaction Mechanisms
  Graduate Prerequisites: (CASCH212 & CASCH301) or equivalent, or consent of instructor. - Fundamentals of organic reaction mechanisms related to acid/base catalysis, reactions of the carbonyl group, cycloadditions, nucleophilic displacement reactions, and redox chemistry.
• CAS CH 643: Synthetic Methods of Organic Chemistry
  Graduate Prerequisites: (GRSCH642) - Organic synthesis strategies for total synthesis of complex natural products. Various approaches for organic molecules whose synthesis constitutes major contributions to organic chemistry.
• CAS CH 644: Medicinal Chemistry
  Graduate Prerequisites: strong background in organic chemistry. - Synthetic organic chemistry and pharmacology as applied to development, testing, and production of medically useful agents. Lectures and discussions by research chemists affiliated with leading pharmaceutical companies. A research paper is required.
• CAS CH 645: Transition Metal Chemistry
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: junior standing and CASCH 203/204 (or CH 203/214 or CH 211/212) and CH 232; recommended corequisite: CH 301. - Introduction to the concepts of transition metal-mediated reactions and mechanisms, including electronic structure and properties, reaction mechanisms, kinetics, organometallic compounds, catalytic reactions, and aspects of asymmetric catalysis.
• CAS CH 646: Organic Spectroscopy and Structure Determination
  Graduate Prerequisites: (CASCH212 & CASCH351) or equivalent, or consent of instructor. - Spectroscopic methods in organic structure determination, including mass spectrometry with main emphasis on nuclear magnetic resonance.
• CAS CH 648: Contemporary Drug Discovery
  Graduate Prerequisites: CAS CH 203/204, CH 203/214, or CH 211/212; or equivalent, or consent o f the instructor. - This course is aimed at graduate and advanced undergraduate students who have an interest in drug discovery research. It covers the key theory and practice associated with the discovery and development of drugs and tool compounds. In focusing on the biochemical and pharmacological aspects of drug discovery, it complements GRS CH644 Medicinal Chemistry. Three hours lecture.
• CAS CH 650: Natural Products Chemistry
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: CASCH212 or CAS CH 214; or equivalent, or consent of instructor. Chemical and biosynthetic pathways leading to important natural products derived from fatty acids, terpenes, amino acids, polyketides, shikimic acid, and other biosynthetic intermediates. Three hours lecture, one-hour discussion.
• CAS CH 651: Molecular Quantum Mechanics 1: Fundamentals
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: (CASCH351 & CASCH352) or equivalent. - Postulates and general formalism with emphasis on chemical applications; application to particle in a box, harmonic oscillator, hydrogen atom; tunneling; angular momentum theory, spin, spin-orbit coupling; ladder operators; time- independent perturbation theory, computational methods including tight-binding model and Huckel theory.
• CAS CH 652: Molecular Quantum Mechanics 2: Dynamics and Spectroscopy
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: (GRSCH651) or equivalent. - Graduate Corequisites: (GRSCH654) - Time-dependent perturbation theory; potential surface; Born-Oppenheimer approximation/breakdown; radiation-matter interaction; line shapes; quantum density operator; quantum master equations; spin-boson model. Applications to absorption, Raman and CD spectroscopies; nonlinear and time domain spectroscopies including SHG, pump-probe, CARS, and photon echoes. Computational methods.