Improved Continuous Flow Synthesis of a Diazo Dye in a Teaching Laboratory and Its Digitalization

In recent years, flow chemistry has gained recognition as an efficient and safer method for chemical synthesis in research laboratories and the pharmaceutical industry. Despite its advantages, its integration into educational settings has been limited to a select few institutions. This slow adoption is primarily due to the challenge of transitioning from traditional batch-based experiments, which have been entrenched in curricula for decades. In our efforts to modernize chemical education, we implemented a diazonium-based laboratory experiment from the literature to teach fundamental concepts of organic reactions and chemical kinetics. However, ensuring the reproducibility of results in a classroom setting proved difficult. This work looks into the key factors affecting reproducibility in this context, especially the reaction protocol and kinetics. We discovered from earlier studies on azo coupling that the pH is critical to the success of this teaching experiment. With the updated protocol and corrected kinetics, we observed an improvement in student performance. Based on the kinetics, we developed a digital twin of the experiment, which was evaluated by students taking this class. We aim to teach students to critically evaluate literature while expanding access and fostering equity in chemical education, particularly within underrepresented communities.