International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry

5 min readApr 30, 2021

The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC /ˈaɪjuːpæk, ˈjuː-/) is an international federation of National Adhering Organizations that represents chemists in individual countries. It is a member of the International Science Council (ISC).[2] IUPAC is registered in Zürich, Switzerland, and the administrative office, known as the “IUPAC Secretariat”, is in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, United States. This administrative office is headed by IUPAC’s executive director,[3] currently Lynn Soby.[4]

IUPAC was established in 1919 as the successor of the International Congress of Applied Chemistry for the advancement of chemistry. Its members, the National Adhering Organizations, can be national chemistry societies, national academies of sciences, or other bodies representing chemists. There are fifty-four National Adhering Organizations and three Associate National Adhering Organizations.[2] IUPAC’s Inter-divisional Committee on Nomenclature and Symbols (IUPAC nomenclature) is the recognized world authority in developing standards for the naming of the chemical elements and compounds. Since its creation, IUPAC has been run by many different committees with different responsibilities.[5] These committees run different projects which include standardizing nomenclature,[6] finding ways to bring chemistry to the world,[7] and publishing works.[8][9][10]

IUPAC is best known for its works standardizing nomenclature in chemistry, but IUPAC has publications in many science fields including chemistry, biology and physics.[11] Some important work IUPAC has done in these fields includes standardizing nucleotide base sequence code names; publishing books for environmental scientists, chemists, and physicists; and improving education in science.[11][12] IUPAC is also known for standardizing the atomic weights of the elements through one of its oldest standing committees, the Commission on Isotopic Abundances and Atomic Weights (CIAAW).

Creation and history[edit]

Friedrich August Kekulé von Stradonitz

The need for an international standard for chemistry was first addressed in 1860 by a committee headed by German scientist Friedrich August Kekulé von Stradonitz. This committee was the first international conference to create an international naming system for organic compounds.[11] The ideas that were formulated in that conference evolved into the official IUPAC nomenclature of organic chemistry.[11] IUPAC stands as a legacy of this meeting, making it one of the most important historical international collaborations of chemistry societies.[11] Since this time, IUPAC has been the official organization held with the responsibility of updating and maintaining official organic nomenclature.[13] IUPAC as such was established in 1919.[14] One notable country excluded from this early IUPAC is Germany. Germany’s exclusion was a result of prejudice towards Germans by the Allied powers after World War I.[15] Germany was finally admitted into IUPAC during 1929. However, Nazi Germany was removed from IUPAC during World War II.

During World War II, IUPAC was affiliated with the Allied powers, but had little involvement during the war effort itself. After the war, East and West Germany were readmitted to IUPAC in 1973.[15][16] Since World War II, IUPAC has been focused on standardizing nomenclature and methods in science without interruption.

In 2016, IUPAC denounced the use of chlorine as a chemical weapon. The organization pointed out their concerns in a letter to Ahmet Üzümcü, the director of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), in regards to the practice of utilizing chlorine for weapon usage in Syria among other locations. The letter stated, “Our organizations deplore the use of chlorine in this manner. The indiscriminate attacks, possibly carried out by a member state of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), is of concern to chemical scientists and engineers around the globe and we stand ready to support your mission of implementing the CWC.” According to the CWC, “the use, stockpiling, distribution, development or storage of any chemical weapons is forbidden by any of the 192 state party signatories.”[17]

Committees and governance[edit]

IUPAC is governed by several committees that all have different responsibilities. The committees are as follows: Bureau, CHEMRAWN (Chem Research Applied to World Needs) Committee, Committee on Chemistry Education, Committee on Chemistry and Industry, Committee on Printed and Electronic Publications, Evaluation Committee, Executive Committee, Finance Committee, Interdivisional Committee on Terminology, Nomenclature and Symbols, Project Committee, and Pure and Applied Chemistry Editorial Advisory Board.[5] Each committee is made up of members of different National Adhering Organizations from different countries.[2]

The steering committee hierarchy for IUPAC is as follows:[18]

All committees have an allotted budget to which they must adhere.
Any committee may start a project.
If a project’s spending becomes too much for a committee to continue funding, it must take the issue to the Project Committee.
The project committee either increases the budget or decides on an external funding plan.
The Bureau and Executive Committee oversee operations of the other committees.

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International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry

Contents

Creation and history[edit]

Committees and governance[edit]

Written by Yobare