Chemistry

Course summary

Over two thousand years ago, the Greek philosopher Democritus claimed that the familiar world of colours, tastes and smells is a world of appearances. Reality is atoms in space colliding and coalescing using hooks and barbs on their surfaces. Today, quite a different story is told about how atoms bond to one another and we no longer think they are indivisible but Democritus was fundamentally correct: from the small to the large, things are made up of atoms. Chemistry is the study of the elements and the compounds that they produce. It aims to explain, at an atomic level, the physical and chemical properties of these substances and to discover, by investigation, new substances that may be of benefit or potentially harmful to mankind. It can thus have a huge impact on modern society and the resources available to our society. Building on the concepts covered at GCSE, A-level Chemistry will introduce you to a broad range of advanced topics. It will get you to think like a chemist, by emphasizing the need to provide explanations of chemical phenomena rather than on the ability merely to remember chemical facts. In the first year, you will cover four modules. In Module 1 (Development of Practical Skills in Chemistry) you will learn how to plan and implement experiments and how to analyse and evaluate the results. Module 2 (Foundations in Chemistry) covers atomic structure and bonding. Acid-base and redox reactions are studied as well as equation writing and the concept of the amount of substance. Module 3 (Periodic Table and Energy) looks at the idea of periodicity, Group 2 and the halogens, qualitative analysis, enthalpy changes, reaction rates and qualitative equilibrium. Finally, in Module 4 (Core Organic Chemistry), you will look at hydrocarbons, alcohols, halogenoalkenes, organic synthesis and the analytic techniques of infrared and mass spectroscopy. In the second year, you will study two more modules. Module 5 (Physical Chemistry and Transition Elements) looks at reaction rates and quantitative equilibrium, pH and buffers, enthalpy, entropy and free energy, redox and electrode potentials, and transition elements. In Module 6 (Organic Chemistry and Analysis), you will cover aromatic, nitrogen and carbonyl compounds, carboxylic acids and esters, polymers, organic synthesis, chromatography and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy.