ACS Solidifies Ties With China

An American Chemical Society delegation visited China in April to attend the 28th Chinese Chemical Society (CCS) Congress in Chengdu. The group, which was led by ACS President-Elect Marinda Li Wu, also met with scientists from a number of organizations in Beijing and Shanghai.

The 11-day trip was intended to extend networks created during an April 2005 ACS delegation visit to China, explore opportunities for exchange and collaboration that would benefit members, and further advance the alliance between ACS and CCS. CCS, under the leadership of its new president, Yao Jian-nian, was the main hosting organization for the ACS delegation.

At the congress, Wu presented an ACS proclamation honoring CCS on its 80th anniversary. She was a featured speaker in the CCS Chemical Society Leadership Forum and spent time with hundreds of students at the ACS Publications, Chemical Abstracts Service, and ACS Membership & Scientific Advancement exhibit.

The delegation joined an editorial advisory board meeting of the Journal of the American Chemical Society and heard a presentation on China’s science, technology, and innovation interests and priorities given by chemist Bai Chunli, president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

The delegation next traveled to Shanghai, where members met with senior chemistry faculty at Fudan University and the Laboratory of Advanced Materials (LAM) on the university’s new Jiangwan campus. LAM has developed research emphases in micro- and nano­electronic materials, photoelectric materials and devices, and functional molecular materials.

At the Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry (SIOC), the ACS delegation participated in an ACS on Campus program that attracted more than 100 students and faculty and featured presentations by ACS editors on peer review and best practices in manuscript development (C&EN, May 14, page 47). Meetings with SIOC faculty and researchers highlighted the institute’s interests and work in chemical biology, organic synthetic chemistry, organometallic chemistry, physical organic chemistry, computational chemistry, and cheminformatics.

Wu met with the leadership of the Shanghai International Chemical Sciences Chapter of ACS and discussed the group’s interests and plans for 2012 and beyond.

In Beijing, the ACS delegation toured the new Stanford Center at Peking University, which is dedicated to bilateral academic exchange and network development. The delegation also visited the university’s College of Chemistry & Molecular Engineering, which originated in 1910 as the first chemistry department in China. The college has active research programs in rare-earth materials chemistry, structural chemistry of unstable and stable species, bioorganic and molecular engineering, and nanochemistry technology.

At Tsinghua University, ACS delegation members heard about the school’s research and teaching activities related to bioorganic phosphorus chemistry and chemical biology, organic optoelectronics, interdisciplinary interests in mechanisms and applications of novel enzymes, functional crystalline and nanostructured materials, and traditional Chinese medicine.

At the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the ACS team toured the Institute of Chemistry’s laboratory facilities and was briefed on the institute’s strategic focus on the frontiers of the molecular and nanosciences, organic polymer materials, and chemical biology, as well as energy and green chemistry. Wu and professor Li Jinghai, a chemical engineer and an academy vice president, discussed the shared interests of chemists and chemical engineers worldwide in resolving mesoscale structure in complex systems.

Finally, the Beijing-based firm Sinopec hosted the ACS delegation for a dinner with Dai Houliang, senior vice president and board member, and discussed the corporation’s vision to build a world-class energy and petrochemical company.

Said Wu of the visit: “I believe the best way to achieve better multidisciplinary and international understanding is through person-to-person interactions and by developing friendships, and to this end I am grateful that we had the opportunity to meet so many of our colleagues on this trip and learn of their interests, passions, and vision for chemistry in China.”