Computational Chemistry Column: Teaching ab initio Quantum Chemistry in a Networked Environment

Abstract

The World Wide Web (WWW, Web) has blossomed as an information distribution media in both the public and private sectors; the electronic-information technologies are also revolutionizing educational-program development and dissemination. This work presents the practical exercises for an ab initio quantum-chemistry course that gives an introduction to the methods of numerical quantum chemistry with the goal of enabling students to perform their own ab initio studies. The exercises, which cover a broad range of topics from different areas of physical chemistry, have been developed within the hypertext domain to take advantage of many features unique to this media which are beneficial for instruction purposes. They can be browsed on the World Wide Web at http://www.scsc.ethz.ch/chem/qcii.html.