What does temperature actually measure? Why do your rubber tires heat up? And what is this Entropy thing that I keep hearing about? Thermodynamics and statistical mechanics can help us answer all of these questions. We'll spend the first couple of weeks learning the conceptual and some of the mathematical basis behind Thermodynamics and statistical mechanics, and then we'll take a birds-eye tour of some of the topics listed above.

Do you like being tangled up? Do you do it in chains? Do you think bigger is better? So do polymers. Polymers are all around us, and they behave quite differently from small-molecule substances. We'll explore how basic principles from high school chemistry can allow us to make some sense of how polymers work, and we'll introduce some other concepts in polymer science like tacticity and glass transition. We'll also make a superabsorbent polymer using stuff you can get at CVS. If you come, we promise we won't make any more inappropriate jokes. Maybe.