Boron Chemistry

Michael A. Beckett

doi:10.1515/ci-2015-0121

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Boron Chemistry

Michael A. Beckett

Published/Copyright: February 2, 2015

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From the journal Chemistry International Volume 37 Issue 1

The first international meeting on Boron chemistry, IME Boron, was held at Liblice Castle, Czechoslovakia in 1971. The meeting brought together for the first time boron hydride chemists from both sides of what was then a divided political world. Subsequent IME Boron meetings have been held regularly at triennial intervals. The timing of the most recent meeting, IME Boron XV, matched closely with the centenary of Alfred Stock’s discovery of boron hydrides and with 50 years of extensive carborane research. It is fitting that the venue for IME Boron XV (24-28 August 2014) was in the Czech Republic. The conference was hosted by the Czech Academy of Sciences at the Czech Technical University (CTU) in the beautiful city of Prague.

Topics addressed at the meeting included inorganic and cluster boron compounds, boron materials, and bio-medicinal chemistry. There were 216 registered participants. The program included plenary lectures (2), invited lectures (13), keynote speakers (12), contributed lectures (65), flash poster presentations (21) and poster (75) sessions. The introductory lectures (Prof. B. Stibr, Prof. V.I. Bregadze, and Prof. N.S. Hosmane) included a tribute to pioneers of boron chemistry, recalling 50 years of carborane chemistry. The first plenary lecture (Prof. N.S. Hosmane) presented a historical perspective of carboranes and metallocarboranes (see also Hosmane’s feature in Chemistry International, July 2012, pp. 14-18). The introductory lectures were well attended and enjoyed by all. They were followed by a ‘Welcome’ cocktail party.

The invited lectures were presented by Prof. A. Welch, Prof. H. Braunschweig, Prof. G.-X. Jin, Prof. S. Ghosh, Prof. F. Teixidor, Prof. M. Periasamy, Prof. I. Chizhevski, Prof. T.B. Marder, Prof. E. Hey-Hawkins, Prof. Y. Endo, Prof. J. Michl, Prof. S.O. Kang, and Prof. P.S. Weiss. The plenary, invited, keynote and some selected lectures will be published in a special volume of Pure and Applied Chemistry in early 2015. The keynote and contributed lectures were run in parallel sessions, with plenty of time allocated in the program for poster-viewing and discussion. There were lectures from two of the conference sponsors (IUPAC and Anacor Pharmaceuticals), on “IUPAC activities, including an update on boron nomenclature” (Dr. M.A. Beckett), and on “Benzoxaboroles, a new privileged structure for medicinal chemistry” (Dr. V. Hernandez).

The final scientific session began with a masterful plenary lecture on “15 years of the MNO rule” (Prof. E.D. Jemmis), which was well-received. The International Organizing Committee judged the contributions of young chemists at the conference and Anacor Pharmaceuticals sponsored three Young Chemist Awards. These were presented during the final scientific session by Dr. V. Hernadez (Anacor Pharmaceuticals) to Dr. Amadeu Bonet (Bristol), Dr. Wing Y. Man (Heriot-Watt, Edinburgh), and Dr. Rong Shang (Wurzburg) for their outstanding contributions. The Local Organizing Committee, chaired by Dr. B. Gruner, were thanked and congratulated at the end of the conference on their wonderful job of producing a varied program comprising all aspects of boron chemistry, and for a thoughtful social program.

The group at the baroque Troja Chateau

The social program of the conference included a reception at the baroque Troja Chateau, with a splendid ornate garden, followed by a Jazz-Boat Cruise along the Vltava River though the centre of Prague. The venue of the Conference Dinner was the Villa Richter, close to Prague Castle, with wonderful views of the old town and the Vltava River.

The next conference in this series will be held in Hong Kong, China, in August 2017, with Prof. Z. Xie (The Chinese University of Hong Kong) as Honorary Chair.

http://imeboronxv.cz

Online erschienen: 2015-2-2

Erschienen im Druck: 2015-1-1

Articles in the same Issue

https://doi.org/10.1515/ci-2015-0121