The chemistry of the 21st century, its evolution over time
Oposite feelings
Most people also have contradictory feelings when they listen to chemical or "chemical product". On the one hand, either consciously, we love chemistry. For example, we would all come out of pleasure if they announced that a drug was already synthesized to cure cancer or the development of a medication that controls the AIDS virus.
However, it is also true that the "chemical" or "chemistry" adjective scares us;For many people the synonym of pollutant, harmful or harmful. It is also synonymous with artificial. Somehow the chemical is associated with the artificial and the toxic, as if natural substances were not chemical substances and as if everything natural were harmless.
Between reality and ignorance
On the one hand, the world chemical industry has developed its work without worrying about the economic impact of its activities. In some cases, health profits have been privileged, information on the possible toxicity of a product or side effects has been hidden and it has happened that due to the hurry to put on sale, it prevented all the necessary tests from being carried out. Of the lack of a "chemical culture" that helps evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of using this or that chemical, which allows the harmful to distinguish from the harmless;If we all recognize the importance of having basic knowledge of chemistry, we would be better prepared to prevent the actions of those who want to abuse chemistry products or depend on them.
The public image of chemistry
In chemistry as an angel or as a demon the satanic vision carries the advantage, multiple congresses and informal talks have been held to discuss the subject;In schools, chemistry programs have been modified to make them more attractive and make evident the importance of chemical products and phenomena;At the end of 1998, the "International Chemistry Conception" began in order to motivate people’s interest as well as establish and strengthen links and communication, organizations from more than 115 countries participated, UNAM organized events such as "Chemistry 2000¨ and the "chemistry tianguis", attendees were able to perform experiments, participate in seminars and conferences, and approach to talk with scientists and industrialists. In other places, special books and magazines were published.
The past and the future of chemistry
An important success of the international celebration of chemistry is that this reason the collective reflection on the past, the present and the future of chemistry. Chemistry is a very different science from the practices of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.There are chemicals to those who bother to talk about the past, you consider it too stormy and dark. Chemists are heirs of an ancient tradition committed to revealing the secret of substance transformation.
Modern chemistry consolidated the nineteenth century and benefited from atomic theory at the beginning of the 20th century around 1925 reached maturity and transformed them forever in the world in early 1800 chemicals knew, if perhaps, about 300 substancesAnd today about 19 million are already counted. On average every 13 years this number has been doubled, by 2050 we will reach 300 million different chemical compounds and 5000 million for the year 2100.
Chemistry is undoubtedly the best tool we have, which will surely be big problems for the 21st century: food shortages, the appearance of new diseases, the exhaustion of conventional energy sources and the deterioration of the environment.On the other hand, the understanding of the physical properties of substances based on the atomic structure will lead to the development of new materials, which will undoubtedly revolutionize areas such as microelectronics, energy storage and distribution systems, and environmental control.
In the next millennium, chemistry will have to develop weapons to know the monsters of their present and past, and face them. Among them are distinguished: the destruction of the ozone layer and global warming.The high ozone concentration at soil and devastation generated by acid rain in the large cities caused by the chemical reactions that occur inside the combustion engines of our means of our means of our means of our mediatransportation.
A chemically informed population
The huge benefits and advances in our quality of life due to chemicals will always cost;The challenge is to develop processes that maximize the benefits and reduce the impact on health and environment. It is also about having a chemically informed and educated population that can judge and make decisions about materials and substances, the management of the waste that generates and the consequences a population whose voice has the weight to avoid abuse and negligence in shortIt’s about pursuing a millennium in which the phrase has chemistry does not invoke demons.
Leave feedback