Photochemistry in Chemistry Meetings

A high point in the history of photochemistry corresponds to the first years of the twentieth century. As it may be seen in Chap. 3, most elements of the theoretical framework of this discipline were available and a consistent picture was beginning to take form in these years, although it would require at least 20 years to arrive at a satisfactory formulation [1]. However, as it happens not rarely in chemistry, it seemed that the discovery of reactions and their application may precede theory. In fact, intense work, though carried out in a small number of laboratories, called attention by the international community to this discipline and by 1910 photochemistry seemed well established as one of the most promising fields of chemistiy. 

This concept was perhaps most clearly expressed by Patemo, who addressing the 7th International Symposium on Applied Chemistry (the precursor of lUPAC series) in 1909 in London (where the section on photochemistry was one of the best attended [2]) declared that now chemists should concentrate on getting the same results, indeed better ones, through a shorter, easier, cheaper path [3]. This new approach should start once again from the study of nature. After having tmderstood which compounds nature produced, it was now time to tmderstand 

there seemed to be a consensus that photochemistry was destined to be one of the main approaches for new—-and convenient—synthetic methods. 

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