Intern: Manuel Casillas

Mentor: Michael Sushchikh

Faculty: Eric McFarland

Curriculum Overview

The Surface Area to Volume Ratio of Nanoparticles, part A lab is a guided lab designed to help students understand how nanoparticles may be more effective by investigating how the surface area-to-volume ratio of a substance is affected as its shape changes. This lab is meant to complement a chemistry unit on catalysts. Understanding how catalysts work involves studying chemical reactions at the molecular and atomic scale. For this reason, catalysis can be considered one of the earliest forms of nanoscale science.

The Surface Area to Volume Ratio of Nanoparticles, part B lab is inquiry-based and should be used immediately after doing the Surface to Volume Ratio of Nanoparticles, part A lab, using the same clay sample as before.

How Catalysts Work—a Nanoscale Phenomenon is a demonstration and review that is designed to help students understand how catalysts work on the nanoscale, and is designed to be used after doing the Surface Area to Volume Ratio of Nanoparticles labs.