Chemistry: The Science in Context

The Fifth Edition's new coauthor Stacey Lowery Bretz, uses visualization tools--based on Chemistry Education Research and focused on the particulate nature of matter--to help students self assess what they know before, during, and after each chapter. Smartwork5 allows instructors to use this pedagogy as a diagnostic, and students receive hints and answer-specific feedback within the system. New ChemTour animations further support visualization at a molecular level and are integrated throughout the media package.

Stacey Lowery Bretz is a University Distinguished Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. She earned her BA in chemistry from Cornell University, MS from the Pennsylvania State University, and a PhD in chemistry education research (CER) from Cornell University. Stacey then spent one year at the University of California, Berkeley as a post-doc in the Department of Chemistry. Her research expertise includes the development of assessments to characterize chemistry misconceptions and measure learning in the chemistry laboratory. Of particular interest is method development with regard to the use of multiple representations (particulate, symbolic, and macroscopic) to generate cognitive dissonance, including protocols for establishing the reliability and validity of these measures. She has been honored with both of Miami University's highest teaching awards: the E. Phillips Knox Award for Undergraduate Teaching in 2009 and the Distinguished Teaching Award for Excellence in Graduate Instruction and Mentoring in 2013. In 2015, she was honored as Chemist of the Year by the ACS Concinnati Local Section.

Geoffrey Davies has BSc, PhD, and DSc degrees in chemistry from Birmingham University, England. He joined the faculty at Northeastern University in 1971 after postdoctoral research on the kinetics of very rapid reactions at Brandeis University, Brookhaven National Laboratory, and the University of Kent at Canterbury. He is now a Matthews Distinguished University Professor at Northeastern. His research group has explored experimental and theoretical redox chemistry, alternative fuels, transmetalation reactions, tunable metal-zeolite catalysts and, most recently, the chemistry of humic substances, the essential brown animal and plant metabolites in sediments, soils, and water. He edits a column on experiential and study-abroad education in the Journal of Chemical Education and a book series on humic substances. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and was awarded Northeastern's Excellence in Teaching Award in 1981, 1993, and 1999 and its first Lifetime Achievement in Teaching Award in 2004.

Natalie Foster is emeritus professor of chemistry at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. She received a BS in chemistry from Muhlenberg College and MS, DA, and PhD degrees from Lehigh University. Her research interests included studying poly(vinyl alcohol) gels by NMR as part of a larger interest in porphyrins and phthalocyanines as candidate contrast enhancement agents for MRI. She taught both semesters of the introductory chemistry class to engineering, biology, and other nonchemistry majors and a spectral analysis course at the graduate level. She is the recipient of the Christian R. and Mary F. Lindback Foundation Award for distinguished teaching.

Thomas R. Gilbert has a BS in chemistry from Clarkson and a PhD in analytical chemistry from MIT. After 10 years with the Research Department of the New England Aquarium in Boston, he joined the faculty of Northeastern University, where he is currently associate professor of chemistry and chemical biology. His research interests are in chemical and science education. He teaches general chemistry and science education courses and conducts professional development workshops for K-12 teachers. He has won Northeastern's Excellence in Teaching Award and Outstanding Teacher of First-Year Engineering Students Award. He is a fellow of the American Chemical Society and in 2012 was elected to the ACS Board of Directors.

Rein V. Kirss received both a BS in chemistry and a BA in history as well as an MA in chemistry from SUNY Buffalo. He received his PhD in inorganic chemistry from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where the seeds for this textbook were undoubtedly planted. After two years of postdoctoral study at the University of Rochester, he spent a year at Advanced Technology Materials, Inc., before returning to academics at Northeastern University in 1989. He is an associate professor of chemistry with an active research interest in organometallic chemistry.