Crystallography in Croatia on occasion of the 25 th anniversary of the foundation of the Croatian Crystallographic Association

Croatian Crystallographic Association (CCA) is the Scientific council for crystallography of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts. The activities of the CCA are described, on occasion of the 25th anniversary of its foundation, with a special attention on those during the International Year of Crystallography, IYCr2014.

that period.Many crystallographers from Croatia were trained in prominent international laboratories.A number of scientists from other republics of the former Yugoslavia obtained MSc and PhD degrees in Zagreb.
In the seventies and eighties, the laboratories in Zagreb were equipped with modern instruments for XRD, TEM and associated methods, enabling research of crystal structures of inorganic, organometallic and organic compounds, as well as microstructure at ambient and elevated temperature.YCCr published a journal, the Annual of the Yugoslav Centre of Crystallography, containing papers based on plenary lectures and abstracts of short contributions given at annual conferences (in English), lists of publications of the YCCr members, titles of MSc and PhD theses of the YCCr members, and minutes of annual YCCr Assembly meetings.YCCr was also a member of the European Crystallographic Committee (ECC); B. Kamenar was the In September, 2012, the organization of ECM29 was undertaken by the Croatian Association of Crystallographers (CAC; Hrvatska udruga kristalografa, HUK), a legal unity consisting of a group of crystallographers emerged from the CCA (the members of the previous Organizing Committee of the ECM29).The agency Globtour Event was chosen to help the organization of the ECM29.In order to provide financial support for the activities and promotion of the ECM29, the CAC prepared several project proposals and applied to various authorities.The CAC was in a permanent connection with the ECA Council and ECA Executive Committee, giving regular progress reports on the advancement in organization of the ECM29.
ECM29 was a great success: 1060 scientists from 55 states, from all continents, attended the Meeting, more than at all previous ECMs.The programme included two plenary lecturers, 16 invited lecturers, 250 oral and 520 poster presentations, distributed among 50 microsymposia.There were also ten satellite meetings.From Croatia, 47 participants delivered 8 oral and 35 poster presentations.B. Kojić Prodić talked on History of Crystallography in Croatia, and S. Popović gave a lecture Nikola Tesla, scientist and inventor-discovery of X-rays.The Croatian crystallographers may be proud for an excellent organization of ECM29; they received a lot of congratulations from eminent members of the international crystallographic community.
In spite of great efforts in organization of the ECM29, the crystallographers in Croatia performed a series of activities during the International Year of Crystallography, IYCr2014, proclaimed by the General Assembly of the United Nations:  Taking into account all the achievements mentioned above, the ECA Council decided that the 3 rd European Crystallography School, ECS3, would be organized by the CAC in Bol in 2016.That event followed immediately after the 24 th Croatian-Slovenian Crystallographic Meeting, CSCM24, which also took place in Bol and organized by the CCA and the SCS.These two events represented the Summer of Crystallography in Croatia.This is the report on the CSCM24 submitted to the IUCr Newsletter: CSCM24 was held from September 21 st to 25 th , 2016, in a small town of Bol, the oldest town on the Island of Brač,

C
vice-president and president of the ECC in the period1978- 1984.Due to the war in Yugoslavia, the 13 th European Crystallographic Meeting (ECM13) scheduled for Ljubljana, Slovenia, in 1991, was transferred to Trieste thanks to good relations among crystallographers in Italy (L.Randaccio), Croatia (B.Kamenar) and Slovenia (L.Golič).During the ECM13, a plenary lecture was given by the Nobel laureate R. Huber (Germany), and a satellite meeting on Synchrotron radiation was organized.After the disintegration of Yugoslavia and proclamation of independence of Croatia in 1991, the Presidency of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts (CASA), dissolved the YCCr and, following the suggestion of the Advisory board (B.Kamenar, B. Kojić Prodić, S. Popović, B. Gržeta) and the support of all crystallographers in Croatia, founded The Scientific Council for Crystallography of the CASA-Croatian Crystallographic Association (CCA; Hrvatska kristalografska zajednica, HKZ) on February 28, 1992.B. Kamenar was elected president and S. Popović secretary of the CCA.The CCA joined the European Crystallographic Association (ECA) in 1992, during the ECM14 in Enschede, and the IUCr in 1993, during the 16 th Congress of IUCr in Beijing.Since 1992, CCA and the Slovenian Crystallographic Society (SCS) have been organizing annual joint Croatian-Slovenian / Slovenian-Croatian Crystallographic Meetings (CSCM/ SCCM) with international participation, alternately in Croatia and in Slovenia.Twenty four meetings have been organized so far.# The reports on the meetings have been published in the IUCr Newsletter.Invited speakers at the Meetings have been, among others: C. Giacovazzo, G. Zanotti and M. Zema (Italy), M. Kaftory (Israel), I. Hargittai (Hungary), M. Jaskólski (Poland), W. Duax (USA), H. Flack and N. Ban (Switzerland), P. Naumov (Japan), R. Dinnebier and H. Fuess (Germany), B. Kobe (Australia), E. and G. Dodson (UK), E. Tillmanns (Austria).Papers based on plenary lectures have been occasionally published in Croatica Chemica Acta (for CSCMs) and Acta Chimica Slovenica (for SCCMs).Members of the CCA edited a special issue of Croatica Chemica Acta, Vol.82 (2009), a Festschrift dedicated to D. Grdenić on occasion of his 90 th birthday.Following the invitation of the Editorial Board of IUCr Newsletter, an extended paper on the history, activities and achievements of the CCA has been published in IUCr Newsletter, 19 (2011) 5-18, as the first paper on crystallography in 14 South-East European countries.Today, about one hundred twenty scientists are members of the CCA, conducting research in a number of laboratories in departments of universities, scientific institutes and industry.The Croatian crystallographers study biologically active molecules, proteins, organometallic compounds, pharmaceuticals, microstructure of composites and its relation to physical, chemical and biological properties.All the members of the CCA represent the Assembly, and the Assembly elects the CCA Executive Committee for a period of four years.## D. Balzar was a member of the IUCr Commission on Powder Diffraction, B. Kojić Prodić is a co-editor of Acta Cryst.C, S. Popović was a member of the European Powder Diffraction Committee, and M. Đaković is a member of the ECA Executive Committee.One of the most important days for CCA was August 27, 2011, when the ECA Council accepted the bid presented by the representatives of the CCA and decided, by a great majority of votes, that the 29 th European Crystallographic Meeting, ECM29, would be held in Rovinj, Croatia, in August 2015.This represented a great recognition of crystallographic achievements in Croatia by the international scientific community.The CCA Executive Committee elected the Organizing Committee of the ECM29, chaired by A. Višnjevac and M. Đaković, and the Croatian members of the Programme Committee, chaired by N. Ban; M. Luić has been elected the Chair of the ECM29.
term, the authors being S. Popović, A. Tonejc, and M. Mihaljević, published in 2014 by the Institute of the Croatian Language and Linguistics.8) A review Hundred years of Crystallography, by B. Kojić Prodić, and K. Molčanov, was published in Croatian journal Kemija u industriji (Chemistry in Industry) 62 (2013) 247-260.9) A review Chemical Crystallography before X-ray Diffraction, by K. Molčanov and V. Stilinović, was published in Angewandte Chemie Int.Ed. 53 (2014) 638-652.10) A lecture IYCr2014-one hundred years of exploring the world of atoms was presented by S. Popović before the CASA, Zagreb, April 24, 2014.11) A lecture Nikola Tesla, scientist and inventor, and the discovery of X-rays was presented by S. Popović before the CASA, Zagreb, November 11, 2014.; also published in: Distinguished Croatian Scientists in the World, Croatian-American Society & Croatian Heritage Foundation, Ed.J. Herak, 7 (2014) 122-134, 250-262; Matematičko fizički list 64 (2013/2014) 241-250.12) Postgraduate courses on contemporary crystallography were held by senior scientists and university professors, the members of the CCA and the CAC.13) Presentations on popular crystallography were presented by members of the CCA and the CAC on TV and radio.14) Crystal-growing competition was organized by E. Meštrović, CAC and CCA in PLIVA; participants in competition were pupils in secondary schools; the best works were rewarded; the valuable results of competition will be used for the moving exhibition and promotion of crystallography in Croatia.15) The Promotion brochure Crystallography matters!, edited by IUCr and UNESCO, was translated in Croatian and published in the Croatian journal Kemija u industriji (Chemistry in Industry) 63 (2014) 217-225.16) A special issue of the Croatian journal Priroda, No. 6, 2014, was devoted to IYCr2014, containing 12 papers on crystallography written by members of the CCA and the CAC; editors were N. Judaš and V. Stilinović.

1 )
Scientific meeting Contemporary Crystallography in Croatia (chaired by S. Popović), dealing with the present studies and perspectives, was held in Zagreb on September 30, 2014 and organized by the CCA under the auspices of the CASA.
2) Proceedings of the Scientific meeting Contemporary Crystallography in Croatia (25 reviewed papers, in Croatian with extended abstracts in English), published by the CASA, Zagreb, in 2015; Ed. S. Popović.