[Il Divo]

Hey all, just had what might be a bit of an odd question. I'm getting ready to take entrance exams for my grad program come the fall and my coordinator mentioned that it might be a good idea to study some of these concepts to keep them fresh in memory.

Going through old Organic/Thermodynamics text books, I get the distinct sense of a narrative. I feel like all the concepts directly build off each in a logical manner. For Inorganic, I've mainly used Atkins' Inorganic Chemistry, but at times it feels like a random mixture of topics that don't necessarily overlap well with each other, even though they're all important.

For research, I'm mostly interested in nanoparticles and photovoltaics, but I've heard that's well beyond the scope of an entrance exam. I was wondering if someone might have a list of the topics they consider absolutely essential to a proficient Inorganic Chemist.

Thanks in advance.

[mjc123]

Off the top of my head (some of this may count as Phys Chem, but is necessary to proper understanding of Inorg Chem):
Atomic structure, electron configurations, Aufbau principle, periodic table. Periodic trends in properties.
Chemical bonding; ionic, covalent. Concepts of valency: oxidation state and coordination number. VSEPR and MO theories.
Basic chemical thermodynamics & kinetics.
Symmetry & group theory; spectroscopy. Basics of crystallography, common crystal structures.
Electrochemistry: electrode potentials, electrochemical series.
Transition metal coordination chemistry, d configurations, low/high spin, spectrochemical series.
Basics of organometallic chemistry (does that count as Inorg Chem these days?)
Basics of common analytical techniques e.g. spectroscopy, chromatography.
Plus a fair bit of simple factual what-reacts-with-what chemistry - properties of common elements, simple compounds e.g. oxides, halides, basic aqueous chemistry, typical oxidation states.
And enough maths to do the above properly (including basic statistical analysis of data).

[Il Divo]

Off the top of my head (some of this may count as Phys Chem, but is necessary to proper understanding of Inorg Chem):
Atomic structure, electron configurations, Aufbau principle, periodic table. Periodic trends in properties.
Chemical bonding; ionic, covalent. Concepts of valency: oxidation state and coordination number. VSEPR and MO theories.
Basic chemical thermodynamics & kinetics.
Symmetry & group theory; spectroscopy. Basics of crystallography, common crystal structures.
Electrochemistry: electrode potentials, electrochemical series.
Transition metal coordination chemistry, d configurations, low/high spin, spectrochemical series.
Basics of organometallic chemistry (does that count as Inorg Chem these days?)
Basics of common analytical techniques e.g. spectroscopy, chromatography.
Plus a fair bit of simple factual what-reacts-with-what chemistry - properties of common elements, simple compounds e.g. oxides, halides, basic aqueous chemistry, typical oxidation states.
And enough maths to do the above properly (including basic statistical analysis of data).

That's perfect. Thank you very much!