ACS NEWS BREAKING DOWN WALLS Burke climbs the Great Wall with ICCAS professor Liu Minghua.
HIGH-LEVEL ACS DELEGATION IN CHINA
ed by the ACS visit, ICCAS put much effort into arranging useful meetings. The delegation visited the Natural Science Foundation (NSFC), which is China's equivalent of the U.S. National Science Foundation; the Ministry of Science & Technology (MOST); Beijing's Tsinghua University; Peking University; the China Association for Science & Technology (CAST); the Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry (SIOC); and a high-tech industrial park in Shanghai. At CAST, the delegation met with the group's president and with Deng Nan, the daughter of China's past leader Deng Xiaoping. Deng Nan is a director of CAST Bai Chun Li, president of the Chinese Chemical Society and a vice president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, made time to meet the ACS team, joining it for dinner even though he had just returned from a trip to the U.S. the previous night.
THE DELEGATION was impressed. "China has come out of the wreckage of the Cultural Revolution to become a home for basic research in all disciplines," Burke observes. Achieving its current status was not easy for China. During the Cultural RevJEAN-FRANÇOIS TREMBLAY, C&EN H ONG KONG olution, a political upheaval that went on from 1966 to 1976, universities were mostly closed in China and few people could go HINA is TURNING INTO A sci- I and the U.K. Stang is convinced that, within 15 years, China will be the leading con- abroad. This was a period when people now entific and industrial superpowaged 50 to 60 would have been in gradutributor of papers originating outside the er at a blazing pace, and the time ate school. As a result, most chemistry facU.S. Jacobs credits Stang for bringing to for the American Chemical Soulty members in China are below the age her attention last year the urgency for ACS ciety to set up joint programs is of 50. Afewyears ago, China launched the now, ACS leaders believe. A team from ACS to engage China. "100 Talent" program to encourage emitook the exceptional step of visiting BeiIn addition to Jacobs and Stang, the 11nent Chinese academics abroad to return jing and Shanghai for 10 days in April to member ACS delegation included ACS to the motherland. identify ways the society can collaborate President WiUiamF. Carroll;ACS Board of with Chinese scientific organizations. Directors ChairJames D. Burke; ACS PastThere are about 117,000 doctoral stuPresident Eisa Reichmanis; University of "It's been increasingly clear that China dents in China. It is unclear how many California, Los Angeles, chemistry and bioand its scientists are major players on both are studying chemistry, but a single orchemistry professorJoan S. Valentine, edthe scientific front and the industrial ganization, the top-ranked Shanghai Infront," MadeleineJacobs, ACS's executive j itor of Accounts of Chemical Research-, and stitute of Organic Chemistry, has 4 0 0 C&EN Editor-in-Chief Rudy M. Baum. Ph.D. students. T h e r e are dozens of director and chief executive officer, says. "If The members of the U.S. delegation, many chemistry Ph.D.-granting institutions in we don't open doors and take advantage of whom were in China for the first time, of getting to know our Chinese counterChina, several with hundreds of doctorparts, the U.S. ultimately will be less com- visited labs, attended lectures, asked and al students. answered countless questions, met govpetitive in the world," she adds. School labs vary in quality At ICCAS, the labs are untidy, some students do not Journal of the Amencan Chemical Society ernment officials, and considerably improved their understanding of the state of wear protective glasses when performing Editor PeterJ. Stang, who made use of his chemistry in China. reactions, and a few powerful lasers are set relationship with senior scientists in Chiup unsafely at eye level. At SIOC, on the na to facilitate the trip, says, "Chinese The main hosting organization for the other hand, facilities are comparable with chemists are already world-class in some ACS delegation in Beijing was the Instithe ones at good schools in the U.S. Conareas." He says China now ranks fourth in tute of Chemistry Chinese Academy of struction programs are under way at sevterms of total number of papers published Sciences (ICCAS), a top institution eral Chinese schools to expand and upfrom outside the U.S. in the 34 ACS jour- whose researchers regularly contribute to grade facilities. nals and magazines, afterJapan, Germany, I I international journals. Evidently delight-
Society plans to waste no time in launching joint programs with emerging scientific powerhouse
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ACS NEWS Even though it is rapidly advancing, chemistry in China faces numerous challenges, some of which are similar to those that chemistry in the U.S. faces, the delegation found. For example, there is a growing trend among the top students to study business instead of science. The image of chemistry in China is also being negatively affected by industrial accidents. But several of China's chemistry challenges are spécifie to the country For example, chemistry faculty privately complained to members of the delegation that their research funding is to a disproportionate extent linked to their ability to publish in international journals like JACS or Nature. One Chinese chemist observed that to get funding, it was preferable to publish in JACS, even if he personally thought the Journal of'Physical Chemistry was more relevant to his area of research. Members of the ACS delegation were impressed by the passion for chemistry that students at Peking University expressed, a feeling that is becoming rarer in the U.S., according to one delegate. "I chose chemistry because it is a prosperous and promising science," Cong Huan, a third-year undergraduate said. Cong was admitted to Peking, a highly coveted school, because he had represented
GETTING TOGETHER Jacobs (from left), Stang, ICCAS Director Wan Li-Jun, and Cheng chat after a meeting in Beijing. One challenge that ACS faces in enlarging exchanges with China is that students and schools in the U.S. do not appear to place a high priority on international exchanges. Burke pointed out in a speech at NSFC that 9 9 % of U.S. students have never studied abroad and that 80% of
LEARNING Reichmanis (from left), Burke, and Carroll listen to a poster presentation by ICCAS professor Wang Yilin, who explains her current research. China at the International Chemistry Olympiad. Valentine observed that the Chinese graduate students she had overseen at UCLA had been remarkably good. This is partly because China's education is very competitive and only the best of the best earn scholarships to study abroad, Chinese scientists explained. 48
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U.S. colleges have never collaborated internationally Jacobs, however, expects that ACS's new programs with China will be popular. 'ACS has a very heterogeneous membership, so it's certainly possible that we have some members who believe that we should focus all of our attention on the U.S.," she
says. But members will find out that there are benefits to exchanges with China, including possible employment opportunities. "China has a large and growing talent pool, but the country will be seeking talent from all over the world," she notes. Meanwhile, she adds, the U.S. is falling behind European countries in establishing joint programs with China. It is not clear what the new programs will be. Preliminary discussions with Chinese counterparts indicated their interest in a joint symposium for young chemists similar to a program that ACS has with Germany Great care will have to go into the planning because, for instance, Chinese scientists have faced new difficulties since 2001 in obtaining visas to visit the U.S., Jacobs says. As for other programs, ACS will, when possible, take advantage ofwork that has already been done by other organizations. "We will also be working with NSF and other organizations in the U.S., such as the National Academy of Sciences, which already have cooperative arrangements in China," she adds. On the Chinese side, there is a high level of interest in cooperating with ACS, especially in ways in which Chinese scientists are contributors in a joint endeavor instead of merely learning from the U.S. At MOST in Beijing, Vice Minister of Science & Technology ChengJing-Pei noted that "too many Americans have a {backward} view of China." As China emerges as a science superpower in the next two decades, this view will change. And ACS will play a role in helping its members be involved as China progresses. • WWW.CEN-0NLINE.ORG
ACS NEWS
COMMUNITY ACTIVITIES AWARD WINNERS
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T THE SPRING NATIONAL MEET-
ing in San Diego, members of the American Chemical Society Committee on Community Activities selected winners for the 2004 National Chemistry Week Poster Contest and the Chemvention Competition, which were organized by ACS's Office of Community Activities. In the 2 0 0 4 N C W Poster Contest, K-12 students were asked to design a poster based on the 2004 N C W theme, "Health & Wellness." Awinner and an honorable mention awardee were selected in
each of four grade categories; first-place winner received a handheld color television, while honorable mentions garnered a set of handheld two-way radios. The winners are the following: • K-2nd grade. First place: Tara Prabhu, NorthJersey Section; honorable mention: Courtney Strey, San Antonio Section • 3rd-4th grade. First place: Kira Prabhu, NorthJersey Section; honorable mention: Taylor Garrison, Mid-Hudson Section • 5th-8th grade. First place: Rebecca Peot, Milwaukee Section; honorable mention: Helen Xu, Delaware Section
• 9th-12thgrade.Rrstplace: Tranh Chen, Chemical Society ofvvàshington; honorable mention: Sehee Kim, Philadelphia Section For the 2004 Chemvention contest, active ACS student affiliate chapters were challenged to develop a procedure or device to measure the amount of albumin in an aqueous solution of powdered egg whites as accurately and precisely as possible. Five finalists were announced during the San Diego ACS Student Affiliate Award Ceremony The University of Scranton took top honors, winning a grand prize of $2,000 to be used toward the purchase of a computer system. Finalists were Gannon University, Erie, Pa.;Tarleton State University Stephenville, Texas; the University of Colorado, Denver; and the University of Pittsburgh, Titusville. Each team received $50. •
POSTER CHILDREN Winning posters for the NCW contest: (clockwise from bottom left) K-2nd grade, by Tara Prabhu; 3rd-4th grade, by Kira Prabhu; 5th-8th grade, by Rebecca Peot; and 9th-12th grade, by Tranh Chen.
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