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The European Commission's Green Deal is a major policy initiative aiming to achieve a climate-neutral, zero-pollution, sustainable, circular and inclusive economy, driving both the New Industrial Strategy for Europe and the Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability. Innovative materials can help to reach these policy goals, but they need to be safe and sustainable themselves. Thus, one aim is to shift the development of chemicals to Safe- and Sustainable-by-Design, and define a new systems approach and criteria for sustainability to achieve this. An online workshop was organised in September 2020 by the Joint Research Centre and the Directorate-General Research and Innovation of the European Commission, with participants from academia, non-governmental organisations, industry and regulatory bodies. The aims were to introduce the concept of Safe- and Sustainable-by-Design, to identify industrial and regulatory challenges in achieving safer and more sustainable Smart Nanomaterials as an example of innovative materials, and to deliver recommendations for directions and actions necessary to meet these challenges. The following needs were identified: (i) an agreed terminology, (ii) a common understanding of the principles of Safe- and Sustainable-by-Design, iii) criteria, assessment tools and incentives to achieve a transition from Safe-by-Design to Safe- and Sustainable-by-Design, and (iv) preparedness of regulators and legislation for innovative chemicals/nanomaterials. This paper presents the authors' view on the state of the art as well as the needs for future activities, based on discussions at the workshop and further considerations. The case of Smart Nanomaterials is used to illustrate the Safe- and Sustainable-by-Design concept and challenges for its implementation. Most of the considerations can be extended to other advanced materials and to chemicals and products in general., (Copyright © 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Multiple-choice examinations play a critical role in university admissions across the world. A key question is whether imposing penalties for wrong answers on these examinations deters guessing from women more than men, disadvantaging female test-takers. We consider data from a large-scale, high-stakes policy change that removed penalties for wrong answers on the national college entry examination in Chile. The policy change reduced a large gender gap in questions skipped. It also narrowed gender gaps in performance, primarily among high-performing test-takers, and in the fields of math, social science, and chemistry., Competing Interests: The authors declare no competing interest.

Kia ora! This special issue of Chemistry - An Asian Journal celebrates the breadth and depth of chemistry research being carried out across the eight Universities in New Zealand as well as by some of their alumni. It also coincides with the 150 th anniversary of the founding of New Zealand's first university, the University of Otago., (© 2019 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.)

At the 2011 International Chemistry Olympiad in Ankara, with 71 participating countries, Switzerland achieved two bronze medals thanks to two outstanding students.

Despite the repeated calls to stop, most notably in a technical publication of the International Union for Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC), the use of the term 'heavy metal' appears not to have declined in the scientific literature and there is little evidence that the IUPAC instructions and those of other publications have had any measurable impact on this widespread usage. Indeed, the use of the term is increasing rather than declining. Four options are presented to solve this dilemma.

Analytical method development should aim at delivering reliable measurements within a given application. This implies that method validation is integrated in the development process, because it enables to establish a method's performance capabilities, and to demonstrate its fitness-for-purpose. Although analytical chemists mostly are familiar with the validation guidelines within the discipline of their responsibility, we believe that they may take advantage of a better acquaintance with recommendations among disciplines. Therefore, we review the guidance given in 4 disciplines (laboratory medicine, pharmacy, environment, and food), with emphasis on the proposed experimental protocols, acceptance criteria and interpretation strategies by statistical significance testing. Last but not least, we give incentive towards a modernized validation design.

This work deals with the use of organic systematic nomenclature in scientific literature, its quality, and computerized methods for its improvement. Criteria for classification of systematic names in terms of quality/correctness are discussed and applied to a sample set of several hundred names extracted from the literature. The same structures are named with three popular state-of-the-art nomenclature programs - AutoNom 2000, ChemDraw 10.0, and ACD/Name 9.0. When comparing the results, all nomenclature tools show a significantly better performance than 'average chemists'. One program allows the generation not only of IUPAC names but also of CAS-like index names that are compared with the officially registered names. The scope and limitations of nomenclature software are discussed and a comparison of the programs' actual capabilities is given.

The subject matter in chemistry courses reflects almost nothing of the issues that chemists are interested in. It is important to formulate a set of topics--and a Medical College Admissions Test reflecting them--that would leave chemistry departments no choice but to change their teaching.

The European Commission has decided on harmonized classifications for a large number of individual chemicals according to its own directive for classification and labeling of dangerous substances. We have compared the harmonized classifications for acute oral toxicity to the acute oral toxicity data available in the RTECS database. Of the 992 substances eligible for this comparison, 15% were assigned a too low danger class and 8% a too high danger class according to the RTECS data. Due to insufficient transparency-scientific documentations of the classification decisions are not available-the causes of this discrepancy can only be hypothesized. We propose that the scientific motivations of future classifications be published and that the apparent over- and underclassifications in the present system be either explained or rectified, according to what are the facts in the matter.

ECVAM's initiatives in validation have received significant support from the European Centre for Ecotoxicology and Toxicology of Chemicals (ECETOC), especially through the provision of reference chemical data banks, which contain peer-reviewed, high-quality in vivo data on commercially available chemical substances. Chemicals have been selected from these ECETOC data banks for validation studies on alternative methods for skin corrosion and irritation and for eye irritation and, in addition, an ECETOC task force peer-reviewed the selection and classification, on the basis of in vivo data, of chemicals used in the validation of three alternative methods for developmental toxicity. More recently, ECVAM and ECETOC have been pursuing parallel initiatives on the proposed new EU chemicals policy, with the common goals of ensuring that industry and European Commission resources are used to investigate only those chemicals that pose a significant risk to human health and the environment, and that the Policy requires that any testing which is required follows the Three Rs principles of reduction, refinement and replacement.

The European Commission (EC) White Paper on a Strategy for a Future Chemicals Policy calls for the collection of adequate information about chemicals, in order to ensure their appropriate risk management. The White Paper proposes a stepwise and flexible approach to all chemicals produced in amounts above 1 tonne/year/manufacturer, including testing, if information cannot be provided by other means. The required information should be collected by the end of 2012. The EC services are currently preparing the drafts for the future chemicals legislation.

The current chemicals regulation in EU member states provides sufficient data on new chemicals but almost non on the about 100.000 existing chemicals. To improve the situation the EU Commission is proposing in a recent White Paper on a strategy for a new chemicals policy to regulate new and existing chemicals in an identical manner. The Commission suggests to use in vitro methods to provide information rapidly on hazardous health and environmental properties of chemicals. The fundamental change in the testing strategy, which is relying on in vitro methods rather than testing in animals is most welcome not only from the scientific and economic point of view but also from the perspective of the protection of animals and the environment. A calculation of the costs and time for testing all existing chemicals in animal experiments shows that this task is unrealistic from a financial point of view and also when taking into account the time required for testing. Taking into account the proposals provided by several working groups of the EU validation centre ECVAM during the past year, a concept is described that will allow the testing of all existing chemicals applying only non-animal tests. Since the new testing strategy will be cheaper and faster it will be more acceptable from both the financial and the ethical point of view. Finally, establishing the proposed new in vitro tests in the safety testing strategy will require considerable funding of validation studies by the EU Commission.

The European Commission is planning to put forward drafts for a new chemicals legislation by June 2002. In fulfillment of an Environmental Council Conclusion, Working Groups have been set up for consultation during the ongoing preparatory stage. There, members of the General Directorates Environment and Enterprise discuss relevant topics with representatives from authorities, industry, environmental and animal protection organisations. There is agreement that animal tests shall be reduced to a minimum. However it is still unclear how this goal can best be achieved. In this context, the designing of testing strategies will play a major role. It is explained, why fixed test catalogues should be replaced by flexible tiered testing strategies and how concrete waiving strategies can contribute to avoiding animal tests. Another important aspect is the EU-wide implementation of a clause on the avoidance of duplicate testing, which is already enforced in Germany and Austria. In these Member States, first parties have to provide data from previously performed animal tests to second parties. Finally, it is discussed that the application of new non-animal tests can be promoted, if the revised EU chemicals policy once again contains the legal framework for an EU-specific acceptance of new test methods.

In February 2001, the European Commission adopted a White Paper on a Future Chemicals Policy. Its main goals are better to protect humans and the environment from unknown risks through chemicals. The "promotion of non-animal testing" is one of the key elements of the proposed strategy. For low production volume chemicals, only data from in vitro-tests are to be requested. The data requirements for higher production volume chemicals shall be designed flexibly so that only data relevant for the respective chemical are collected. From the point of view of animal welfare concrete risk management strategies should be defined before test batteries are put together. The test catalogues currently listed in the Classification Directive 67/548/EEC are to be replaced by tiered testing strategies, and concrete waiving strategies are to be designed so that the requested tailor-made testing can actually be realized. Another essential prerequisite for the promotion of non-animal testing is that the funding of alternative method research is formulated as a key action with a concrete budget in the Sixth Research Framework Program of the European Union.

Over a 3-month period, 61,496 errors were detected in clinical laboratory reports by 631 participants in the College of American Pathologists' 1990 Q-Probes program. Each error detected was defined as an opportunity for improvement. Almost 4% of the detected errors were attributed to nonlaboratory personnel and approximately 4% (A errors) had a major impact on patient care. Rates of B (serious errors, but unlikely to affect patient care) and C errors (minor clerical errors) were approximately equal. When expressed in terms of measures of laboratory work loads, four of six measures of mean errors were lowest in blood banking, intermediate in chemistry and microbiology, and highest in hematology. Thirteen percent of participants did not have an error detection system in place. We conclude that many errors go undetected, and we recommend that an effective system for error detection in patient reports should be employed in all laboratories.

Fluoroacetic salts belong to the most toxic chemicals. They are used for various purposes, and form stable compounds in some plants. A case of poisoning with ethyl fluoroacetate is presented in detail. Diagnostic problems and therapy which failed due to the late diagnosis and dramatic progress in the symptoms of poisoning are also discussed. Fluoroacetic ion alone is non-toxic but in vivo forms fluorotricarboxylic acid, which blocks cellular metabolism at the citrate stage. Symptoms occur with a delay but lethal synthesis of fluorotricarboxylic acid leads to the irreversible cellular dysfunction, especially in CNS and circulatory system. Poisoning may be treated with monoacetin and acetamide. An emphasis is on health hazards resulting from the exposure to fluoroacetate and necessity to observe strictly safety regulations.