The idea to establish an International Society for Nuclear Chemists was a personal dream of Prof. Turan Unak of the Edge University, Turkey, which appeared in his mind at the beginning of the 1990s. He had very clear the great importance of nuclear chemistry in the chemistry curriculum, the further perspective of nuclear chemist in the 21st century with an expected growing demand of all different kind of radioactive applications, but also the common problems of nuclear chemistry specialization, due to the apparent lack of nuclear chemists worldwide. He outlined very well the situation during the 1st International Symposium on Radiation Education” in 1998, in Hayama, Japan. He realized his dream in 2005 when during the 1st International Nuclear Chemistry Congress in Kusadasi, Turkey, the Society was established and Prof. Turan Unak was elected as the first INCS President. He was ri-elected three times up to 2015. During this time, but also in the period before the establishment, he was actively engaged with the mission to create the INCS and made a great effort to present the INCS as an active international society which covers all scientists and technologists involved in the nuclear chemistry and in the related fields under its umbrella.
Since 1980, the educational capacity of many European institutions of higher education in the field of radiological and nuclear engineering has decreased, because of the conjunction of less interest among students and less interest among the academic and political authorities.
Although the situation widely differs from one university to other and from one country to other, many departments that were initially able to propose a large panel of orientations in this field had to reduce their offer and to concentrate it on a few specialties. On the other hand, financial restrictions have made more difficult to maintain and develop facilities and equipment needed for practical training of students.
For several years, an increased national and international cooperation is seen as an important contribution to find solutions to these problems. Several networks have been developed, some of them focused on specific domains, other concentrated on high level professional training, some strongly structured and other not, some developed with European help and other trying to grow on their own.
There is a growing and growing needs all over the world of using ionizing radiations and their applications with a particular attention to radiopharmaceuticals, but also in the transportation of nuclear wastes and related safety problems, in the development of alternative and safer nuclear reactors and different particle accelerators, in the nanoparticle field with a particular attention on nanosafety, in the environment study and more generally for the health of the people.
In this scenario the nuclear chemists have a crucial and very important rule in the society, but in spite of this there is a greater and greater lack of the presence of this figure in the society. This is related to a very important absence in education, training and formation of new young generation about nuclear and radiochemists as a consequence of academic problems, which are waiting to be resolved worldwide.
For this reason, the establishment of INCS with the scope to cover all of the directly or indirectly people related to the chemistry of radioactive materials and to the applications of nuclear radiations may surely be very helpful in organizing nuclear chemists worldwide, facilitating the solution of their common problems. Therefore, nuclear chemists will be able to have an international power in the scientific platforms: let’s make much more beautiful our globe for the next generations developing the nuclear chemistry concepts and ensuring the participation of nuclear chemistry in the peaceful applications of nuclear sciences and technology.
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