Science
lUPAC council tackles a variety of issues In Warsaw, lUPAC council voted to start new journal, adopt systematic approach to naming elements with atomic numbers over 100 The International Union of Pure & Applied Chemistry will have a new publication if plans now actively under consideration reach fruition. Tentatively titled Pure & Applied Chemical News, the first issue is scheduled to appear in January 1979. Its aim will be to keep individual chemists around the world posted on the activities and functions of IUPAC, presented in such a way that it rapidly reaches a large segment of chemists outside IUPAC circles. This is one of the developments that emerged from the 29th IUPAC council meeting that the Polish National Academy of Sciences hosted in Warsaw at midmonth. Delegates from nearly 30 nations met to discuss the affairs of the organization, elect new officers, vote on a number of issues that bear directly on the work of chemists everywhere, and plan future strategies. At the conclusion of the twoday assembly, Dr. Robert W. Cairns, executive director of the American Chemical Society, handed over the IUPAC presidential reins that he has held for the past two years to Dr. Georges Smets, professor of macromolecular chemistry at the University of Louvain, Belgium. In his "state of the union" message,
Rossiter: provide strong incentives
outgoing president Cairns remarked that "the future well-being of IUPAC is for the first time critical to the fulfillment of essential world needs. In the past, we have prided ourselves on the fulfillment of the [professional] needs of world scientists. Now, it seems to me, science stands alone as the arbiter and exponent of human survival. We, as chemists, have an essential role to play in this world drama." A recognition of the role that IUPAC can play in human affairs finds concrete expression in CHEMRAWN, Chemical Research Applied to World Needs. First proposed by Dr. Charles. G. Overberger, who led the U.S. delegation to the IUPAC conference in Munich four years ago, the idea has been actively pursued and developed. Now the stage is set for the first CHEMRAWN conference to be held in Toronto next July. Jointly sponsored by ACS, the Chemical Institute of Canada, and IUPAC, it has as its theme future sources of organic raw materials. Dr. Bryant W. Rossiter, director of the chemistry division of Eastman Kodak's research laboratories in Rochester, N.Y., and chairman of the CHEMRAWN planning committee, was in Warsaw with the U.S. delegation. He told his IUPAC colleagues that "the first CHEMRAWN purpose embodies the first step of science, namely, to identify human needs amenable to satisfaction through chemistry, with particular attention to needs of global and multinational dimension. A second purpose is to provide a nonpolitical, international forum for the gathering, discussion, advancement, and dissemination of chemical knowledge deemed useful for the improvement of man and his environment. A third is to provide an international, nongovernmental source of information for the benefit of research institutions, national governments, and international agencies with respect to chemistry and world needs. IUPAC has the opportunity, indeed the responsibility, to play an increasingly important role in applying chemistry and chemical technologies to the worldwide needs of mankind," At the Toronto conference, key figures from government, industry, and academia will attempt to define and set in perspective those factors that ultimately will determine the sources of organic raw materials necessary to support world chemical industries at the end of the century, Rossiter points out. Emphasis will center on fossil hydrocarbons, particularly alternatives to petroleum, renewable resources such as wood and other plant materials, and urban, agricultural, and industrial wastes. Relevant basic re-
Cairns: fulfillment of world needs search dealing with catalysis, photosynthesis, large-scale biochemical transformations, and nitrogen fixation will form an important part of the technical sessions. "Thus," Rossiter explains, "the conference will deal not only with the future lifeblood of some of our major industries, but will provide strong incentives for those working in the more basic and exploratory areas relating to new sources of chemicals and feedstocks. It is hard to imagine a conference of higher global importance or greater interest to the industrial and academic communities," he says. The future source of CHEMRAWN, which Cairns classes as "a statement of purpose and not a new organization," will be influenced largely by the outcome of the Toronto meeting. Nevertheless, the planning committee already has set its sights on other topics for consideration. One would have as its theme future development of the metals and minerals industries in northern Europe. This might be planned as part of the 27th IUPAC Congress to take place in Helsinki, Finland, in 1979. That IUPAC associates itself with concepts such as those embodied in CHEMRAWN is something of an evolutionary departure for a body that for long has concerned itself largely with such staid scientific topics as the establishment of atomic weights and symbols. "IUPAC now is more than just nomenclature and codification," Cairns comments. "I think we have registered something in the way of the broad human needs that may be fulfilled through chemistry." Set up in 1919, IUPAC's objectives are "to promote continuing cooperation Aug. 29, 1977 C&EN
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among chemists of the member countries; to study topics of international importance to pure and applied chemistry which need regulation, standardization, or codification; to cooperate with other international organizations which deal with topics of a chemical nature; and to contribute to the advancement of pure and applied chemistry in all its aspects." It now is the largest scientific union of its kind with members representing more than 40 countries. Membership comprises so-called adhering organizations such as the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society of the U.K. rather than individual chemists or chemical societies as such. The union sponsors a large number of international symposia and meetings each year on a diverse range of chemical subjects. But the basic scientific work is carried out by members of divisions and commissions chosen for their expertise in various fields. Currently there are six divisions—one each responsible for analytical chemistry, applied chemistry, organic chemistry, physical chemistry, inorganic chemistry, and macromolecular chemistry. There is also a clinical chemistry section and central committees on publications, finance, nomenclature, and chemical education. Defining atomic weights, establishing chemical codification, standardizing analytical techniques, compiling thermodynamic data, and the like, remain fundamental concerns of the "pure" side of IUPAC's activities. Nevertheless, there was evidence in Warsaw of increasing involvement in "applied" aspects of chemistry. For instance, the council members voted unanimously to create a Standing Committee on Chemistry &* Industry. Among its terms of reference, this committee will "establish important areas of chemical science in IUPAC related to ongoing industrial needs [and] put to industry enquiries on major chemical matters." Cairns says that "the new committee presents a broader opportunity for linkage between IUPAC and industry." The move is an outgrowth of a decision taken some years ago to set up what now has become IUPAC's International Company Associates Group (ICAG). Some 150 leading chemical companies around the world are in the scheme. "The significance of establishing the Standing Committee on Chemistry & Industry is that industrial involvement can be maintained and improved now that industry has a formal platform inside the union," points out Dr. Jack Barrett, a former director of Monsanto U.K. and a prime mover of ICAG. "There now will be a better method for representatives of the chemical industry to report their special views to the union on a formal basis by way of a regular reporting system." Barrett notes that a number of useful collaborative studies already have been initiated between various branches of the chemical industry and IUPAC divisions. One such program centers on the relationship between molecular structure and the physical properties of commercial 20
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polymers. Representatives of almost every major producer of plastics are on a working party chaired by Imperial Chemical Industries' Dr. Peter Clegg, Barrett observes. Other areas he points to where collaboration might be initiated or extended include heterogeneous catalysis, health and environmental aspects of industrial chemicals, and continuing education of chemists in industry. Despite the shifts in attitude that already have become apparent among those participating in IUPAC in recent years, incoming president Smets, who is the first Belgian to hold this office, advocates an even greater restructuring of the union. Speaking from experience spanning 20 years of direct involvement in IUPAC activities, he would like to see more of a project-related structure evolve rather than adherence to the more classical differentiation of chemical pursuits. "In my opinion, one should not talk in terms of pure chemistry and applied chemistry," he remarks. "There should not be a separation of the applied field from the fundamental. Today, there is a much greater overlap and interplay among the different branches of chemistry." Indeed, Smets hints that he wouldn't object to seeing the name of the organization changed to the International Union of Chemistry. However, he also is a realist and he doesn't expect his views to bring about such a major change during his tenure. The thorny issue of trying to decide between the U.S.-proposed and U.S.S.R.-proposed names of the synthetic elements 104 and 105 didn't crop up at the Warsaw meeting as it has on several past occasions. But Dr. Norman Greenwood, president of the inorganic division, formally unveiled a systematic approach to naming elements with atomic numbers of 101 and beyond that was adopted. The system uses a combination of Greek and Latin roots. For instance, element 101, mendelevium, is un-nil-unium with the symbol Unu. Element 102, nobelium, is
Smets: a project-related structure un-nil-bium, symbolized by Unb, and so on. Element 500, if it ever is made, will be pent-nil-nilium, Pnn. During the Warsaw meeting, a number of the union's routine business matters also were attended to. For example, Davos, Switzerland, a resort area near Zurich, was selected as the venue for the next general assembly in 1979. Syria was voted in as a member country. Officers of the six divisions and the clinical chemistry section were appointed. Seven new members were elected to the IUPAC board. They are Dr. Jack Barrett for the U.K.; Nobelist Sir Derek Barton for France; Dr. Andrew Cole for Australia; Dr. Anders Kjaer for Denmark; Dr. Jan Michalski for Poland; Dr. Charles Overberger for the U.S.; and Dr. C. N. R. Rao for India. Dr. Heinrich Zollinger, rector of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, was elected vice president. Dermot A. O'Sullwan, C&EN London
Technology NASA urged to mine the moon and asteroids It's time for the National Aeronautics & Space Administration to begin thinking more seriously about the moon and asteroids as sources of power and important mineral resources. That was the conclusion reached by a panel of 30 scientists early this month at the University of California, San Diego, at a NASA-sponsored Workshop on Near Earth Resources. Beginning as soon as possible, the space agency should broaden its focus to include a wide-ranging exploratory program covering the chemical and physical makeup of the moon and asteroids as a first step toward exploiting the mineral, metallic, and other chemical resources they contain, said Dr. James Arnold of the UCSD chemistry department at a postworkshop press conference.
"If a crash program aimed at the use of these near-earth resources were needed tomorrow, we lack many of the basic facts on which to build it," Arnold says. However, it was clear that the participants were not lacking in ideas to get at least a limited exploratory program off the ground by the mid-1980's. With the right kind of preparation, the panel concludes, man probably could mine the moon and "earth-crossing" asteroids for building materials for an orbiting solar power station at considerably less cost than it would take to launch the same materials into space from the earth's surface. The participants agree that the idea is attractive because of the low "escape velocity" of the moon and asteroids as compared to earth, as well as the advantages offered for materials fabrication
