Corina Brown

Contact Information

Education

Ph.D. - University of Northern Colorado (Chemical Education)
M.S. - University of Northern Colordao (Biochemistry)
B.S. - Polytechnic Institute of Bucharest, Romania (Chemical Engineering)

Research/Areas of Interest

Biochemistry represents the bridge between biology and chemistry. Many pre-health and allied-health students find topics such as biomolecules and metabolism fascinating as they apply to life processes, health, and diseases. However, one of the difficult aspects of this course arises from the fact that students must be able to transfer knowledge of concepts presented in previous chemistry courses.

Currently, Dr. Brown's research group is exploring the following topics:

• cognitive and affective factors that impact how students learn chemistry and biochemistry
• lecture and laboratory curriculum development for pre-health and allied-health chemistry courses
• the design and development of assessment materials in the areas of organic chemistry and biochemistry.
• exploration of equity in chemistry instruction
• transfer from general and organic chemistry to biochemistry
• the use of virtual reality technology for visualizations of biomolecules and metabolic processes

The exploration of these research topics utilizes qualitative and quantitative research methodologies as for example interviews (students, faculty) and thematic analysis, combined with general and comparative statistics and psychometric methods.

In the field of Biochemistry, research with undergraduate students explores areas of drug delivery systems, drug metabolism by using analytical instrumentation as: HPLC, FTIR spectroscopy, UV-vis, GC-MS, fluorometry.

https://scholar.google.com/citations?view_op=list_works&hl=en&user=4h2s65kAAAAJ

Publications/Creative Works

Recent Publications

Nedungadi, S.; Brown, C.E.; Paek, S.H. Differential Item Functioning Analysis of the Fundamental Concepts for Organic Reaction Mechanisms Inventory. Journal of Chemical Education, 2022, https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jchemed.2c00242

Nedungadi, S. and Brown, C.E. “Thinking like an electron: Concepts pertinent to developing proficiency in organic reaction mechanisms” Chemistry Teacher International, 2021, 3(1), 9-17. doi.org/10.1515/cti-2019-0020 

Brown, C. E., Henry, M. L. M., Hyslop, R. M. (2018). Identifying relevant acid-base topics in the context of a prenursing chemistry course to better align health-related instruction and assessment. Journal of Chemical Education, 95(6), 920-927. https://doiorg.unco.idm.oclc.org/10.1021/acs.jchemed.7b00830