President's Column Resilience in Pandemic Time by Christopher Brett
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ast time I wrote to you, we were finishing 2019, IUPAC’s centenary celebrations and the International Year of the Periodic Table of the Chemical Elements (IYPT). Since then, our world and how we related to it has changed dramatically. One year ago, we could not have imagined today’s reality. We are dealing with the consequences of a virus we knew little about and for which vaccines are starting to become available only now. The fact that the time for the development of vaccines has been shortened from several years to less than one year, is in itself the result of a huge scientific achievement; it involves interdisciplinary collaborations from microbiology to medicine, but also crucially underpinning chemistry. The pandemic has meant that our daily habits have changed, that we cannot travel or only with heavy restrictions, and that now we mostly meet on-line. One of the consequences of the lockdowns in the early part of 2020 and of the slowdown or halting of industrial chemical processes was a reduction in pollution in some parts of the world and the remarkable resulting increase in air and water quality. It is direct evidence of the effect that humankind has on the planet’s ecosystems. This lockdown period was only a small hiccup in the tremendous changes that have occurred over the last century and many of the industrial processes have started again. However, it should give renewed impetus to what we, as chemists, can and should do to improve our world whilst lessening the effect we have on the planet and to take the opportunity to move towards greener industrial processes. In this, industry is our ally and we should work together towards the same goals. My last President’s column set out a road map of the general things that we should be doing in order to fulfil our vision and strategic plan. None of this has changed. This included increasing IUPAC’s visibility and encouraging the whole chemistry community to work together on the many crucial questions that need to be addressed. In unpredictable times, our objectives continue to be essential. For IUPAC, providing a common language
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Chemistry International
January-March 2021
for chemistry, and advocating and promoting the free exchange of scientific information, continue to be objectives of critical importance. The free exchange of scientific information, in particular the public’s open access to scientific information is a topic which has come more to the fore during the last year and the debate continues. Open access should be a leveller for different countries and should aid in making science available to all. How this can be achieved and what global policies will have to be implemented to make it a reality is still the object of discussion in which IUPAC is fully engaged. The importance of fostering sustainable development is also growing, not only owing to the changes caused by the pandemic but also to other evidences of climate change. We have witnessed the consequences of what we are doing to the environment directly and we need greener chemical industrial processes, recognising that all that we do influences different interwoven cycles. If we disrupt these natural cycles there will be consequences. The important objective of reaching the 17 Sustainable Development Goals in the UN Agenda 2030 is ever in our minds. IUPAC’s centenary and IYPT activities in 2019, have carried on into 2020, to ensure that the enthusiasm that was generated continues and forms part of a legacy for the future. The periodic table challenge was a tremendous success in 2019, so much so that it has been followed by a version 2.0 equally successful. To increase its reach, the challenge 2.0 has been translated into several languages including Arabic, Chinese, Russian, and Spanish. The Global Women’s breakfast has been held in 2019 and 2020 and will again in 2021, on February 9. The Top Ten Emerging Technologies featured in 2019 were followed by a further ten in 2020 and this activity will also continue in 2021. One of the more negative consequences of the pandemic for research scientists, besides the temporary closure of laboratories, has been the cancellation or postponement of conferences. More positively, some have become or will become on-line conferences, allowing a broader participation not limited to participants normally able to travel. Whilst needing adaptation to this new way, it does open up possibilities of, for example, sharing pre-recorded presentations while devoting more time to discussion. The year of 2020 has also had some more positive notes. Our journal Pure and Applied Chemistry (PAC) has just celebrated its 60th Anniversary. It was established in 1960 in order to publish reports and papers from IUPAC commissions, sections and divisions in a systematic and unified way, and some conferences proceedings. Today, the journal basic structure remains the
