NEW YORK, NY — The United Nations has declared 2014 to be the year of crystallography.
The International Year of Crystallography (IYCr2014) will be launched during an opening ceremony to be held on 20 and 21 January 2014 at UNESCO Headquarters (Paris). This international launch will be a showcase for crystallography and crystallographers, featuring eminent scientists, industrialists and personalities from around the world. Keynote lectures will be ensured at this occasion by Professor Brian Kobilka, 2012 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, on his vision of crystallography and its role in elucidating biological mechanisms; and by Professor Jenny Glusker on “Crystallography past, present and future”.
The opening ceremony will also comprise an interactive session called “Young Talented Crystallographers of the World”, bringing together promising young minds from all the regions of the globe, and a special session called “Crystallography in the BRICS countries – success stories and roles for development”, which will feature key speeches by high officials and presidents of the National Science Academies of the BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) on their leadership positions in areas such as innovations in pharmaceuticals, materials science, high energy physics, nanotechnology, mineralogy and others.
A special session of the launch event will also be dedicated to the immense contribution to crystallography of Arab scientists of the Islamic golden age, through presentation of crystallography-related symmetries in art, historical artifacts and architecture.