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As the COVID-19 pandemic posed a great deal of challenge to the higher education community, the curricula for online instruction had to be developed in a very short time period. Adaptations for Organic Chemistry I and II with Laboratory courses have been made for the online transition in response to the pandemic, and the insights gained through individual and collaborative efforts are presented by Georgia Gwinnett College (GGC) Organic Chemistry faculty. Herein, course specific information with a distinction between lecture and lab and the analysis of student assessment and withdrawal provide insights into the virtual instruction. The initiative of instructors played a crucial role during the transition and for maintaining student engagement, and the insights will add valuable resources for further virtual or hybrid instruction.

The hysteretic behaviors in the photoresponsivity of a Langmuir film are found for the first time. The hysteretic should be related with the phase transitions that occur in the Langmuir film. The structure change of the Langmuir film of spiropyran (SP) is examined.

Self-assembly of small molecules can lead to many different types of objects and phases. This mini-review concentrates on the formation of one-dimensional objects and their transformation into gels from solutions/sols of 12-hydroxystearic acid, a molecule derived from the castor bean, and its derivatives in a wide variety of liquids. It is shown how the molecular packing within the one-dimensional objects and the nature of the derived gels can be correlated with systematic variations of the gelator structure and the type of liquid. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Thermal and photo-optical properties of azoxybenzene/alkyloxy-azobenzene containing chiral dimesogens are presented. Alkyloxyazobenzene containing dimesogenic materials exhibited two kinds of smectic A phases. Photoirradiation at temperatures exhibiting smectic phases of pure materials in azobenzene linked dimesogens resulted in formation of the isotropic phase, and this was systematically studied at different liquid crystalline temperatures. The efficacy of these compounds as a dopant in the glassy liquid crystalline material was also explored. Increasing concentration to 4 wt%/5 wt% in azobenzene/azoxy-benzene derivatives caused a dramatic red-shift in the wavelength of reflected light by the host cholesteric glassy liquid crystal. Photo-isomerization of these dopants led to a blue-shift of the reflected light, and this effect could be used to tune the light reflectivity of these mixtures over the visible region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The self-assembly and gelating ability of a set of N-alkyl-(R)-12-hydroxyoctadecylammonium chlorides (NCl-n, where n = 0-6, 18 is the length of the alkyl chain on nitrogen) are described. Several are found to be ambidextrous (gelating both water and a variety of organic liquids) and very efficient (needing less than ca. 0.5 wt % at room temperature). Structure-property correlations at different distance scales of the NCl-n in their hydro- and organo-gels and neat, solid states have been made using X-ray diffraction, neutron scattering, thermal, optical, cryo-SEM and rheological techniques. The self-assembled fibrillar networks consist of spherulitic objects with fibers whose diameters and degrees of twisting differ in the hydro- and organo-gels. Increasing n (and, thus, the molecular length) increases the width of the fibers in their hydrogels; an irregular, less pronounced trend between n and fiber width is observed in the corresponding toluene gels. Time-dependent, small angle neutron scattering data for the isothermal sol-to-gel transformation of sols of NCl-18/toluene to their gels, treated according to Avrami theory, indicate heterogeneous nucleation involving rodlike growth. Rheological studies of gels of NCl-3 in water and toluene confirm their viscoelastic nature and show that the hydrogel is mechanically stronger than the toluene gel. Models for the different molecular packing arrangements within the fibrillar gel networks of the hydro- and organogels have been inferred from X-ray diffraction. The variations in the fibrillar networks provide a comprehensive picture and detailed insights into why seemingly very similar NCl-n behave very differently during their self-assembly processes in water and organic liquids. It is shown that the NCl-n provide a versatile platform for interrogating fundamental questions regarding the links between molecular structure and one-dimensional self-aggregation, leading to gelation.