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that primarily printed German research results to one featuring important chemical discoveries from around the world. “It’s fair to say that there has been a complete transformation of this journal due to Peter Gölitz,” Zewail said. “When I was a grad student in the late ’80s Angewandte was already a marquee publication, but we primarily thought of it as a place where Europeans published,” said Carolyn R. Bertozzi, a chemical biologist at the University of California, Berkeley. “But by the time I started my independent career in 1996, Angewandte was a place where American chemists also published their work,” she said. Gölitz took over the helm of Angewandte Chemie just after turning 30, freshly home from a postdoc position in the U.S. “My vision was to attract the best chemists throughout the world to publish in Angewandte,” Gölitz told C&EN. In his office, he hung a big map of North America, which he used to mark the origins of the few manuscripts that trickled in from the U.S. and Canada in the early ’80s. There were too many empty spots for his taste. “I was convinced that scientific publishing should be international. That is, Europeans should publish in American journals—and this was the case at the time—and Americans should publish in European journals, which was not the case. This has changed, and today Asia has also a major role.” BERLIN BASH
A coffee break during Angewandte Chemie’s 125th anniversary symposium.
ANGEWANDTE’S 125TH ANNIVERSARY Chemists from around the world gather to fete the German Chemical Society’s PREMIER PUBLICATION SARAH EVERTS, C&EN BERLIN
nition of what constitutes chemistry and his willingness to publish interdisciplinary in Berlin on March 12 to celebrate the 125th molecular science. Gölitz also introduced anniversary of the German Chemical Sopeer review to the journal. ciety’s journal Angewandte Chemie. Now Gölitz, who has been the journal’s published by John Wiley & Sons, it began editor-in-chief since 1982, is widely acin 1887 as a technical magazine for German knowledged as the man behind Angewandte ONE OF THE FIRST steps toward interindustrial chemists. Today it is one of the Chemie’s progression from a publication nationalization prior to Gölitz’ tenure was most respected journals for molecular and the launch of Angewandte material scientists. Chemie’s English edition in The daylong birthday fest HISTORICAL INDICATORS The number of Angewandte 1962. This move took place featured music from a saxoChemie articles published per year reflects wider political events under the editorial watch of phone quartet as well as talks and changes to the journal. and accolades by more than Wilhelm Foerst, a complia dozen renowned chemcated figure in the journal’s Published articles ists. “Today we celebrate a history. 3,000 1 World War I (1914–18) great event,” said Ahmed H. Foerst, a Nazi Party 2 Beginning of the Third Reich (1933) 2,500 3 World War II (1939–45) Zewail, a chemist at Califormember, took the editorial 4 English version launched (1962) nia Institute of Technology helm in 1933 and “did not 2,000 5 Peter Gölitz becomes editor-in-chief (1982) 6 Peer review introduced (1980s) who won the Nobel Prize in prevent Angewandte Chemie Chemistry in 1999. from providing space for 1,500 George M. Whitesides, a criminal National Social1 2 3 4 5 6 1,000 Harvard University chemist, ist (Nazi) ideology,” wrote added praise for the jourGölitz in an editorial mark500 nal’s longtime editor, Peter ing the journal’s anniversary Gölitz. “A great journal is the issue in January. Like many 0 90 1900 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 2000 10 reflection of a great editor,” publications during the he said. Whitesides comNazi era, Angewandte Chemie SOURCE: Mario Müller, Wiley/Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. mended Gölitz’ flexible defidid not publish articles by CLOSE TO 1,500 CHEMISTS convened
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Jewish scientists, printed offensive advertisements, and “was full of unbearable language,” said François Diederich, chairman of Angewandte Chemie’s editorial board and a chemist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich. The only year Angewandte Chemie was not published was 1946, as Germany grappled with the end of World War II. This missing year is why the journal is celebrating its 125th anniversary on the 126th year after the first edition: because 2013 represents the 125th year Angewandte Chemie was actually published. IN ANTICIPATION of the anniversary,
Diederich penned a history of the journal (Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., DOI: 10.1002/ anie.201300056). He spent three hours each day for six months browsing through all archival issues of the publication, which was initially named Zeitschrift für die chemische Industrie (Magazine for the Chemical Industry) and went through a handful of other name changes before becoming Angewandte Chemie (Applied Chemistry). “When I started the research, I was under the impression that the publication was just going to be about industry and technology” in its early years, Diederich said. Instead, the archives were “a treasure trove” of material about the history of chemistry in Germany and abroad. He attributes the publication’s breadth to the fact that when it launched, not much information was available except through the printed word.
SO PUNNY! From tributes to 1980s pop band the Bangles (Just another Mannich Monday) to risqué references (Metal ménage à trois), much has been said of the funny kickers that grace the abstracts of papers in Angewandte Chemie. The brains behind the humor range from giddy
journal editors to zealous authors. A recent submission on photochemistry paid tribute to Pink Floyd’s “Shine on You Crazy Diamond,” according to Editor-in-Chief Peter Gölitz. When news of the journal’s anniversary party broke on Twitter, Matthew Hartings, a chemist at
He found full issues in the 1880s devoted to the new area of wine science, obituaries of famous people such as Alfred Nobel and Dmitri Mendeleev, and unexpected news reports from high-profile chemists, such as the one by Fritz Haber about photochemistry he had seen at the World’s Fair in Paris in 1900. Diederich said even in its early days the journal reported on American innovations, such as 1904 articles about Niagara Falls power generation and about American beer factory technology. At that time, most breweries in Germany were still family or monastery operations. Whitesides, who delivered a plenary lecture at the anniversary symposium, noted that he had actually begun reading the journal as a graduate student in the 1960s. Even before the English edition, many people
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American University who tweets as @sciencegeist, asked about “a chemical pun-writing contest.” His question launched a short Twitter pun competition about the party. Contributions included “125 year self-assembly process” and “Activation barrier for self-assembly reduced by cake.”
who didn’t understand German would just look at the figures in articles. “That’s the great thing about chemistry. You can just read the pictures even if you don’t understand the language,” he added. Cornell University’s Roald Hoffmann, another plenary lecturer at the celebration, said he was introduced to the publication around the same time by his longtime collaborator and fellow Nobel Prize winner, Harvard’s Robert Burns Woodward. Together they published the longest article in the journal’s history, which took up an entire issue and which featured some of the first color images in the publication. In the figures, negative and positive orbital lobes were distinguished by blue and green, Diederich said. In fact, Angewandte Chemie’s use of color in figures, cover images, and graphical
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abstracts has long distinguished the journal as a leader among chemical publications, Stuart Cantrill, chief editor of Nature Chemistry, told C&EN. “There is no doubt that many of the publishing innovations pioneered by Angewandte have inspired other journals,” added Cantrill, who was not in Berlin for the celebration. “That the journal continues to thrive and prosper is a credit to its reputation for editorial rigor and uncompromising scientific integrity,” Madeleine Jacobs told C&EN. Jacobs is the executive director and chief executive officer of the American Chemical Society, which publishes C&EN, and was also not in Berlin. “We salute the current editor-in-chief, Peter Gölitz, for upholding that fine tradition of excellence and send all best celebratory wishes for this remarkable anniversary and for continued future success,” she added. Or as Helmut Schwarz, a chemist at Berlin’s Technical University and president of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, said at the fete, “Lang lebe Angewandte Chemie. Long live Angewandte Chemie.” ◾
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The late Nobel Prize winner and Harvard chemist Woodward at his desk with a copy of Angewandte Chemie.
