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A Joint OPCW–IUPAC Project on Education and Outreach Regarding Chemical Weapons

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Chemistry International -- Newsmagazine for IUPAC
From the journal Chemistry International -- Newsmagazine for IUPAC Volume 27 Issue 3

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The Project Place|Information about new, current, and complete IUPAC projects and related initiatives

See also www.iupac.org/projects

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A Joint OPCW–IUPAC Project on Education and Outreach Regarding Chemical Weapons

In the IUPAC report on chemical weapons (Pure Appl. Chem.74(12), 2323–2352, 2002), stress was laid on the importance of spreading knowledge of the Convention on Chemical Weapons and educating chemists and the public on the ethical aspects of these terrible applications of our science. The Committee on Chemistry Education (CCE) is charged with overseeing educational aspects of IUPAC’s activities, and the matter came before the committee at its meetings. The committee was uncertain about how to proceed, for there is a fine line between educating in favor of prohibition and educating, accidentally, for propagation. At its meeting in Istanbul in August 2004, the CCE established a working party (led by Natalia Tarasova) to explore the question of how to proceed.

To take the matter forward, IUPAC President Leiv Sydnes and Task Group Chairman Peter Atkins established contact with the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), based in The Hague, and attended the States Signatories session in January 2005. From that meeting, and a particularly fruitful meeting with Ralf Trapp (OPCW), we found a way forward. A meeting now planned for next July will explore the feasibility of a conference to discover if there are ways ahead in addressing problems of insinuating ethical aspects into already overburdened chemical curricula. Readers who have strong views are encouraged to send them to Atkins, who will try to compile a discussion document for the coming meeting.

For more information and comments contact the Task Group Chairman Peter Atkins <peter.atkins@lincoln.oxford.ac.uk>.

www.iupac.org/projects/2004/2004-048-1-020.html

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Page last modified 21 April 2005.

Copyright © 2003-2005 International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry.

Questions regarding the website, please contact edit.ci@iupac.org

Published Online: 2009-09-01
Published in Print: 2005-05

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  1. From the Editor
  2. Contents
  3. Looking Back and Pondering the Future
  4. Joseph Priestley: Radical Thinker
  5. CHEMRAWM XII: Exploring Solutions to Africa’s Food Crisis
  6. Emerging Issues in Developing Countries
  7. Simples and Compounds
  8. The IUPAC Poster Prize Program
  9. Making an imPACt
  10. Subcommittee Members Teach Short Course on Medicinal Chemistry
  11. Remembering Prominent IUPAC Members
  12. Public Understanding of Science: Identifying IUPAC’s Niche
  13. Uncertainty Estimation and Figures of Merit for Multivariate Calibration
  14. A Joint OPCW–IUPAC Project on Education and Outreach Regarding Chemical Weapons
  15. Categorizing Hydrogen Bonding and Other Intermolecular Interactions
  16. Comparable pH Measurements by Metrological Traceability
  17. Equilibria in Solution: A Software Aid
  18. Provisional Recommendations
  19. Practical Guide to Measurement and Interpretation of Magnetic Properties (IUPAC Technical Report)
  20. An Ontology on Property for Physical, Chemical, and Biological Systems
  21. Spectroscopy of Partially Ordered Macromolecular Systems
  22. Coordination Chemistry
  23. Polymer Networks 2004
  24. Trace Elements in Food
  25. Chemical Education and Sustainable Development
  26. Chemistry for Agriculture
  27. Chemical Thermodynamics
  28. Analytical Spectroscopy
  29. Radiochemistry
  30. Ionic Polymerization
  31. Polymer Science
  32. Mark Your Calendar
https://doi.org/10.1515/ci.2005.27.3.20a

Articles in the same Issue

  1. From the Editor
  2. Contents
  3. Looking Back and Pondering the Future
  4. Joseph Priestley: Radical Thinker
  5. CHEMRAWM XII: Exploring Solutions to Africa’s Food Crisis
  6. Emerging Issues in Developing Countries
  7. Simples and Compounds
  8. The IUPAC Poster Prize Program
  9. Making an imPACt
  10. Subcommittee Members Teach Short Course on Medicinal Chemistry
  11. Remembering Prominent IUPAC Members
  12. Public Understanding of Science: Identifying IUPAC’s Niche
  13. Uncertainty Estimation and Figures of Merit for Multivariate Calibration
  14. A Joint OPCW–IUPAC Project on Education and Outreach Regarding Chemical Weapons
  15. Categorizing Hydrogen Bonding and Other Intermolecular Interactions
  16. Comparable pH Measurements by Metrological Traceability
  17. Equilibria in Solution: A Software Aid
  18. Provisional Recommendations
  19. Practical Guide to Measurement and Interpretation of Magnetic Properties (IUPAC Technical Report)
  20. An Ontology on Property for Physical, Chemical, and Biological Systems
  21. Spectroscopy of Partially Ordered Macromolecular Systems
  22. Coordination Chemistry
  23. Polymer Networks 2004
  24. Trace Elements in Food
  25. Chemical Education and Sustainable Development
  26. Chemistry for Agriculture
  27. Chemical Thermodynamics
  28. Analytical Spectroscopy
  29. Radiochemistry
  30. Ionic Polymerization
  31. Polymer Science
  32. Mark Your Calendar
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