ABCChem convenes in Marrakech

Abstract

The Atlantic Basin Conference on Chemistry (ABCChem) took place Dec. 13–16 in Marrakech, Morocco. More than 180 registrants gathered from 32 nations for the event. It was the second ABCChem , which brings together chemists from countries bordering the Atlantic Ocean. The first was held in Cancún, Mexico, in 2018. The spirit of international conferences is to remove the barriers among people, according to Mama El Rhazi of the University Hassan II Casablanca, one of the organizers and current president of the Federation of African Societies of Chemistry (FASC). “The theme is ‘Linking the World through Chemistry.’ If you can do that, there will be no war, a lot of peace, and a lot of science,” she says. One goal of the conference is to encourage “south-south interactions” across the Atlantic—meaning connecting people from South America and Africa, says Neil Coville of the University of the Witwatersrand and part of