Preface
Authors: Huang Xiaoyu 
Published: March 2014

The 7th IUPAC International Conference on Heteroatom Chemistry (ICHAC-7) was held in Shanghai, China, on 21-25 August 2004. This conference was co-organized by Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS); Chinese Chemical Society; Shanghai Society of Chemistry and Chemical Industry; and State Key Laboratory of Organometallic Chemistry and State Key Laboratory of Elemento-organic Chemistry. Three hundred participants attended the conference, with about 150 attendants from 23 different countries other than China. The scientific program consisted of 8 plenary lectures, 1 keynote lecture, 38 invited lectures, 56 p, and 120 posters. This conference focused on the following 6 major themes:

- Organocatalysis

- Heteroatom chemistry directed toward organic synthesis

- Mechanistic and structural aspect of heteroatom chemistry

- New heteroatom-containing materials

- Biologically relevant heteroatom chemistry

- Supramolecular chemistry of heteroatom.

All the lecture sessions were held in Everbright Exhibition Center. The following highlighted lectures are representative of the quality of material presented at the conference:

- Robert R. Holmes, University of Massachusetts, "Phosphoryl transfer enzymes and hypervalentphosphorus chemistry"

- Christopher A. Reed, University of California at Riverside, "Strongest but gentlest: New acids fororganic and inorganic chemistry"

- Xiyan Lu, Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry, CAS, "Synthetic methodologies using tertiaryphosphines as nucleophilic catalysts"

- Tetsuo Otsubo, Hiroshima University, "Functional oligothiophenes as advanced molecular electronicsmaterials"

- Dao-Ben Zhu, Institute of Chemistry, CAS, "Recent advances of molecular material in theOrganic Solid Laboratory, CAS"

- Ian Manners, University of Toronto, "Catalytic routes to rings, chains, and macromolecules basedon inorganic elements"

- Masaaki Yoshifuji, Tohuku University, "Recent develpments in the chemistry of low-coordinatedorganophosphorus compounds"

- Peter Jutzi, University of Bielefeld, "Cyclopentadienyl and ferrocenyl chemistry of some p-blockelements"

- Andreas Pfaltz, University of Basel, "Design of heterocyclic ligands for asymmetric catalysis"

The organizers also prepared a series of rich social programs for the participants of the conference, which included a welcome party and a city sightseeing tour of Shanghai. ICHAC-7 was a fruitful meeting for all participants, in particular, the young scientists and students who found a world forum to present and discuss their results, meet scientists from other countries, exchange experiences, and socialize with scientists from all fields of heteroatom chemistry. Many of these contacts have led to new cooperation and exchanges among students and young and senior scientists. In addition to the lectures in this issue, six lectures of this conference have been documented in the Chinese Journal of Chemistry, Vol. 23, Nos. 8,9 (2005).

The 8th IUPAC International Conference on Heteroatom Chemistry will be held in 2007 in Riverside, CA and will be hosted by Prof. Christopher A. Reed of the University of California at Riverside.

Xiaoyu Huang

Conference Editor