Case Study: Stanford University Educates Thousands Through the Use of ACD/Labs Online

A few years ago, Stanford University faced a problem involving teaching undergraduates NMR interpretation. How were they to help the hundreds of students who were trying to learn NMR spectroscopy in a manner that was fresh, new, and hands-on? Overheads and text books were the primary tools being used but Stanford sought a better and more interactive method.

Their solution was ACD/Labs Online (I-Lab). Through the use of ACD/Labs Online, students, staff, and faculty could draw structures in a web browser applet, submit them to our ACD/Labs Online server, and obtain predicted ¹H, ¹³C, ¹⁵N, ¹⁹F, and ³¹P NMR spectra. They could also search through chemical shifts, coupling constants, and references for over 400,000 compounds contained in a series of commercial NMR databases encompassing five different atomic nuclei. Students could now be given example experimental spectra with chemical structures and be asked to assign the spectra using the prediction software. More importantly, they could explain why they assigned the spectrum in a particular way by referring back to first principles. The chemical educators at Stanford University essentially removed the static NMR shift table, found at the back of a number of organic chemistry textbooks, and replaced it with an interactive and bold spectral representation of an NMR spectrum. The spectrum highlights an atom, peak/multiplet, or tabular coupling constant by simply placing the mouse pointer over any one of the aforementioned data points.

To date, hundreds of students and staff have used ACD/Labs Online at Stanford University and have had the following comments to say about the service.

From a first year graduate student using I Lab, "I cannot believe how wonderful this is! There was nothing like this when I was an undergrad. If there had been, it would have made things so much easier."

"The Java applet for drawing structures is very intuitive to use. Response time is quick. For HNMR predictions, the ability to see the predicted spectra plus chemical shift tables as well as the structure is very useful. The simultaneous highlighting of a specific region of a structure with associated spectral peaks and chemical shift table values makes I-Lab a wonderful educational tool. It really helps students learn how to analyze and interpret spectra. I-Lab is very popular at Stanford and I strongly recommend site-licensed access for large academic institutions," stated the Head Librarian of Swain Library of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Stanford University.

ACD/Labs Online is a subscription-based or pay-per-prediction service that allows anyone with an Internet connection and web browser, preferably Internet Explorer or Netscape, access to almost all the NMR, physicochemical property value, and nomenclature prediction applications ACD/Labs currently develops. For a complete list of services, visit http://www.acdlabs.com/ilab/services.html. Access to ACD/Labs Online may also be made through both the freeware and commercial versions of ACD/ChemSketch, when connected to the Internet and the ACD/I-Lab Add-on for ChemSketch has been downloaded and installed.

To try ACD/Labs Online you may log in as a guest at the following website http://ilab.acdlabs.com/. To conduct a thorough evaluation of ACD/Labs Online you will need to register at the website or request a site license trial by contacting education@acdlabs.com.

The freeware version of ACD/ChemSketch and ACD/I-Lab Add-on for ChemSketch may be downloaded from http://www.acdlabs.com/download.