406 JOURNAL OF ANALYTICAL ATOMIC SPECTROMETRY, DECEMBER 1986, VOL. 1 Conference Reports 69th Canadian Chemical Conference: 1st-4th June, 1986, University of Saskatchewan, Canada The University of Saskatchewan was the 1986 host of this annual conference of the Chemical Institute of Canada, which covers all aspects of chemistry. The organisers were delighted that the analy- tical chemistry programme turned out to be the biggest in the history of the conference, with 83 invited and contri- buted papers and 9 posters. It is fashion- able for conference organisers to aim for a spectacular opening in the form of light shows, etc., but this time nature obliged during the pre-conference evening mixer with a brilliant thunderstorm and atten- dant tornadoes. Fortunately, the perfect weather which accompanied the remainder of the conference presented this beautiful campus at its best.Cer- fainly , the friendly, informal atmosphere that pervaded during the analytical ses- sions was more in keeping with this weather than the opening storm! Most of the atomic spectrometry presentations were in two symposia: “Microsampling Techniques in Atomic Spectrometry,’’ and “Recent Develop- ments in Plasma Spectrometry.” It was appropriate that the Fischer Scientific Award in analytical chemistry went to Shier Berman of the NRC, who has made outstanding contributions in the areas of both symposia. His award lecture was the opening event of the analytical pro- gramme. The symposium on microsam- pling techniques was concerned mainly with electrothermal atomic absorption spectrometry, reflecting its high level of activity in Canada.Ralph Sturgeon presented the opening lecture on the fundamentals of atomisation, and this was followed by a balanced programme of fundamental and applied papers, includ- ing contributions from both Canada and the USA. A recurring theme was the direct analysis of solids, which is un- doubtedly an area of increasing interest. Also covered was the introduction of microsamples into ICPs, in Gary Hor- lick’s invited presentation. The plasma spectrometry symposium followed and mostly retained the same compact (and lively) audience. Papers were about evenly divided between ICP-AES and ICP-MS, and the strong interest in the latter is hardly surprising as one of the only two instrument manufacturers is a Canadian company.Gary Horlick and Jim McLaren both presented a substantial amount of data, which confirmed that ICP-MS is already approaching maturity as a technique ready for routine use. The speakers on ICP-AES included Mike Blades. Delegates able to drag themselves away from the symposia could visit the impres- sive analytical facilities of some of the Government research stations located on campus. These include the Plant Bio- technology Institute of the National Research Council, the Animal Pathology Laboratory of Agriculture Canada, and the Saskatchewan Research Council, which recently acquired the first ICP-MS instrument in the Province. Kenneth W. Jackson University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Sask., Canada Federation of Analytical Chemistry and Spectroscopy Societies (FACSS): 13th Annual Meeting, 28th September-3rd October 1986, St.Louis, MS, USA Unlike the well known quantum phe- nomenon whereby the act of observation perturbs the system being studied, obser- vation of the FACSS conference perturbs only the observer. With nearly 700 oral presentations delivered over four and a half days in 10 or 11 parallel streams, for the 1500 delegates to listen to, not to mention a sizeable exhibition, 8 half-day or one-day short courses and the employ- ment bureau, it is not possible for one person to have fully covered all aspects of a conference of this size. While I am apologising for the somewhat less than comprehensive coverage I have been able to provide, I have to confess that I sneaked out of some of the atomic spec- troscopy sessions to listen to contributions from electrochemists and flow injection analysts. For most delegates, I imagine, there were some clashes of interest.This meant that some careful planning was needed the night before in order to map out the next day’s schedule. Given the complexity of the programme, some kind of com- puter based optimising strategy is really needed and my recommendation to next year’s organisers is to issue the pro- gramme on floppy disk, together with a modified simplex or critical path analysis sub-routine. I also have to admit that I was viewing ,this conference through the eyes of someone who had never attended a con- ference in the USA before and, in fact, had not set foot on American soil since the first American set foot on the moon.Being of a conscientious disposition, I was able to resist the alternative attractions of rain-soaked, downtown St. Louis, such as they were, and spent most of the working day in the convention centre. As a venue for a conference, this seemed ideal. All the lecture halls were right next to each other and right next to the exhibition hall and the whole lot was very close to the hotel accommodation. Despite there Gateway Arch, St. LouisJOURNAL OF ANALYTICAL ATOMIC SPECTROMETRY, DECEMBER 1986, VOL. 1 being no time allocated for “change over,” there was no problem in getting from one lecture stream to another in time to hear the start of the next lecture. With most of the presentations allocated a total of 20 minutes including questions, it was quite important not to miss the opening few sentences.Atomic spectroscopists have no cause for complaint as every conceivable aspect of the subject was covered in one way or another. Monday saw a morning sympo- sium devoted to “Calibration and Curve Fitting for Atomic Spectroscopy,” one of the streams jointly organised with the RSC. Most of the work was done by my co-organiser, Dr. Nancy Miller-Ihli from the US Department of Agriculture. Our session clashed with one on “Lasers and Mass Spectrometry,” one on “Emission Spectrochemical Analysis, Sources and Signals,” a stream which appeared to feature papers about techniques contain- ing two of everything, “Dual ICP-AES” and “Tandem Flame Atomic Spectro- scopy” from groups at Wayne State and North Carolina State Universities, respectively.This stream also featured the first of no less than 18 contributions from Professor Gary Hieftje’s group at Indiana. Also that morning were a smat- tering of “Hyphenated Techniques in Separation Science,” which included liquid chromatography hyphen any atomic spectroscopy technique you care to name. The afternoon saw the continua- tion of the “Lasers and Mass Spec- trometry” sessions and another of the symposia that the RSC had been involved in. This time it was “Furnace Atomic Emission Spectroscopy” organised jointly by the late Professor John Ottaway and Dr. Jim Harnly (also from the US Depart- ment of Agriculture). This session included contributions from two of the small band of Europeans, Dr. Erik Lund- berg from the University of Umei, Sweden, and Dr.Heinz Falk from the Central Institute for Optics and Spectro- scopy, East Berlin, DDR. Tuesday morn- ing saw the same pair of organisers in action again with a symposium on “Back- ground Correction in Atomic Absorp- tion.” In amongst the contributions that might be expected, was one relatively new technique namely the use of a photodiode array for ICP-AES, described by Dr. Piet van der Plas from Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands. This symposium clashed with one on “ICP- MS.” The afternoon contained a rather mixed bag in “Atomic Absorption Spec- troscopy,” which clashed with “High Cur- rent Emission Spectroscopy Sources.” The early evening contained the poster session, to which delegates were enticed by the offer of some cheese and wine.Again a lot of atomic spectroscopy, but this time mainly applications to real sam- ples that ranged from spruce needles to renal fluids. This was the only aspect of the conference that was not done as well as at a European conference. On the whole, the posters contained too much information that could only be read from a distance of six inches. Wednesday morning kicked off at 8.40 a.m. (as did many of the sessions) with “ICP Excitation Mechanisms,” just the thing to aid the digestion of what the “Burger King” thinks is fit for consump- tion at breakfast time. This theme was continued in the afternoon with “Dis- charge Excitation Mechanism and Scien- tific Fundamentals,” which clashed with “Solids Analysis with Hollow Cathodes, Glow Discharges and Microdischarges” ; this session contained a couple of papers describing the use of a glow discharge source in which considerable increase in the atomic population could be achieved by impacting the surface with a gas jet.It 407 appeared as though the device was avail- able from a company called Analyte Corp. and had been developed at Oregon State University. Running throughout the day was the third symposium that the RSC had helped to organise, “Multi-dimensional Fluores- cence” put together by Professor Jim Miller and Professor Isiah Warner from Emory University. Thursday had an all-day session on “Atomic Fluorescence and Laser En- hanced Ionization Spectroscopies .’, This clashed with both “Solids Analysis with ICP-MS and Spark Discharges” and “Fundamentals of Electrothermal Atomi- sation.” This latter stream was probably the most international with contributions from Sweden (Professor Anders Ceder- gren), West Germany (Drs. Bernhard Welz and G. Miiller-Vogt), the UK (the late Professor John Ottaway), East Ger- many (Dr. Heinz Falk) and Canada (Professor Ken Jackson and Dr. Ralph Sturgeon), Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry was also getting more good coverage in a stream entitled “New Methods and Techniques: ICP-MS and Others. ” The last half day of the conference contained “Applications of Electrother- mal Atomisation,” “Applications of Atomic Spectroscopy” and one of the very few mentions of X-ray methods in a rather heterogeneous stream entitled “Surface, X-ray and Miscellaneous Methods.” The resulting free afternoon just allowed enough time for delegates to visit the amazing Gateway Arch before staggering off to the airport and unwind while watching the TV monitors for announcements about the delayed flights home. Julian Tyson Loughborough University of Technology, UK