To members of ORGLIST, I would like to inform the list of a symposium being held as part of the New Orleans ACS meeting this August entitled "Chemicals and Materials from Renewable Resources." If there are any questions, please feel free to contact me directly. Joseph J. Bozell Senior Chemist National Renewable Energy Laboratory Golden, CO 80401 USA ============================== Call for Papers Chemicals and Materials from Renewable Resources A Symposium co-sponsored by the CELL and CARB divisions to be held as part of the ACS National Meeting in New Orleans, August, 1999 ************************* Renewable carbon is produced at a huge annual rate in the biosphere and has frequently been touted as a valuable source of useful chemicals, intermediates and new products. Using renewable feedstocks will progressively move toward a CO2-neutral system of chemical production. The concept of a "biomass refinery" is often used to describe a process for converting renewable carbon into these materials. Interest in this topic is increasing rapidly as evidenced by the Gordon Conferences on Benign Organic Synthesis and workshops held by the Department of Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Green Chemistry Institute. However, the petrochemical industry has a significant lead in technology for selectively converting their primary raw material into products. The scope of methodology for conversion of biomass is much smaller and the list of products available from biomass is much shorter than for petrochemicals. This symposium solicits papers from research groups currently working to develop the tools necessary for novel, selective chemical transformations of nontraditional feedstocks into small molecules (non-fuel applications) and discrete building blocks from renewables. Feedstocks include monosaccharides, polysaccharides (cellulose, hemicellulose, and starch) extractives, lignin, lipids and proteinaceous compounds. New transformations of these feedstocks using homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis are solicited, as are new biochemical transformations. Papers on mechanism of transformations are also invited. Groups working to identify and exploit new renewable building blocks are encouraged to participate. The symposium anticipates individual sessions on synthesis and use of levulinic acid and levoglucosan, as well as sessions on new transformations and new building blocks from renewables. Please send abstracts by Friday, April 23rd on the standard ACS abstract form to: Joseph J. Bozell National Renewable Energy Laboratory 1617 Cole Boulevard Golden, CO 80401 phone: 303-384-6276 FAX: 303-384-6103 email: bozellj@tcplink.nrel.gov Late abstracts cannot be accepted because of the CELL and CARB division deadlines. __________________ ORGLIST - Organic Chemistry Mailing List WWW Homepage and Archive: http://www.orglist.net/ List coordinator: Joao Aires de Sousa (jas@mail.fct.unl.pt)