IIT Mandi concludes International Conference on Fundamental and Advanced Research in Chemistry (FARC-2024)  

Mandi: Indian Institute of Technology Mandi (IIT Mandi) concluded the ‘International Conference on Fundamental and Advanced Research in Chemistry (FARC-2024)’ dedicated to the current research being conducted on different aspects of chemistry.

Over the years, research in chemistry has experienced tremendous growth, leading to numerous advancements and alternatives for societal betterment. The conference aims to highlight the recent research focusing on both fundamental and applied chemistry in areas including chemical sciences, material sciences, spectroscopy, microscopy, and imaging.

Participants from several countries took part in this event for knowledge transfer in advanced fields of chemistry and to contribute to the betterment of human life. Prof. Laxmidhar Behera, Prof. P. C. Parameswaran, Prof. Chayan K. Nandi, Dr. Garima Agrawal, Dr. Moupriya Das, Dr. Abhishek Dewanji, and Dr. Narayan Sinha of IIT Mandi constituted the local organizing committee of this prestigious conference.

Speaking during the conference, Prof. Chayan K. Nandi, Chair, FARC – 2024, said, “Our dream comes true for organizing such a mega event with a total participation of approximately 300, where 54 eminent speakers along with 6 highly reputed international speakers participated. Their presence made the event a grand success.”

Further Prof. Nandi added that it was a great challenge to organize such a big conference in a remote location, however, we successfully did it with great passion. All our faculty colleagues at the School of Chemical Sciences supported us wholeheartedly in every aspect of the conference. He thanked the Director of IIT Mandi, Prof. Laxmidhar Behera and Chair of the School of Chemical Sciences, Prof. Pradeep Parameswaran for their kind support. He proposed that the conference will be biannual, and next time it will happen in 2026.”

The key topics of the conference included Advanced Functional Materials, Synthetic Organic Chemistry, Green Chemistry, Inorganic & Organometallic Chemistry, Spectroscopy of Materials, Electron Microscopy & Application, Single Molecule Spectroscopy, Nanomaterials & Nanocomposites, Biopolymers & Biomaterials, Theoretical & Computational Chemistry, Photocatalysis & Electrocatalysis, and Waste Management and Sustainability.

One of the keynote speakers, Prof. Frank Jülicher, managing director of the Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems mentioned that he found all the talks stimulating, reflecting very high-quality science. He also added that as the conference covered a wide variety of fields there is an immense probability of exchange of ideas which can help in the advancement of both specialized and multi-disciplinary works.

Another invited speaker, Prof. Bhuvanesh Gupta, mentioned that FARC-2024 at IIT Mandi is the perfect place for scientific meditation considering the immense opportunities for collaborative interactions.

The three-day conference featured distinguished researchers from India and around the world, providing a vibrant platform for interaction. Attendees included experimental and theoretical chemists, light and electron microscopic imaging experts, material scientists, polymer chemists, and more.

FARC – 2024 hosted several eminent speakers around the globe, along with 160 very high-quality poster presentations. These included:

Prof. Amit Meller, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Israel
Prof. Frank Jülicher, Max-Planck-Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Germany
Prof. Rodolphe Antoine, Institut Lumière Matière, France
Prof. Peter Pohl, Johannes Kepler University, Austria
Prof. René M. Königs, RWTH Aachen University, Germany
Prof. F. Ekkehardt Hahn, University of Muenster, Germany
Prof. Tapas Chakraborty. IACS Kolkata, India
Prof. Krishna P. Kaliappan, IIT Bombay, India
Prof. Bhuvanesh Gupta, IIT Delhi, India
Prof. Srabani Taraphder. IIT Kharagpur, India
Prof. Amalendu Chandar, IIT Kanpur, India

among others.

The conference facilitated brainstorming sessions among young and experienced researchers, academicians, technologists, and policy planners for the betterment of the future

Along with the talks, there were many thought-provoking discussions among the participating speakers and research scholars. There are already some ongoing collaborations among the attendees, and new connections are built.  It is expected that all these research collaborations will strengthen through this conference and will open avenues for new research partnerships.

The well-known scientific publication house, Wiley is doing a special collection focused on the conference FARC-2024 with the three reputed journals, Chemistry- An Asian Journal, Asian Journal of Organic Chemistry and ChemNanoMat. The renowned speakers and participants of the conference will be invited to publish their notable contribution in the three peer-reviewed scientific journals.  Prof. Chayan Nandi from IIT Mandi and Prof. Rene M. Koenings from RWTH Aachen University have agreed to be the guest editor for the conference collection. Wiley is happy to collaborate with the conference organizers for the collection which would certainly prove to be resourceful for young scientific minds.