Conférence de chimie : Dirk Kurth , Würzburg University

Sujet: Chemistry at a tipping point

For decades, chemistry offered a recognisable professional identity, secure career prospects and a clear connection between scientific training and industrial practice. When studying chemistry in the 1980s,1990s, and 2000s, lecture halls were crowded. Today, many chemistry departments face declining enrolment, while the discipline is becoming increasingly important to sustainability, advanced materials, energy technologies and data-driven discovery.

This talk examines how this paradox developed. Since the 1980s, restructuring of the chemical industry, changing academic careers, shifts in public perception and fragmented professional pathways have altered the context in which young people encounter chemistry. At the same time, chemistry itself has changed profoundly.

The central question is whether chemistry education still reflects what the discipline has become and what it enables. Strengthening the educational pipeline will require clearer professional identities, greater recognition of chemistry’s contribution and curricula that connect rigorous chemical foundations with the challenges young people will help to address.