Evaluation Report Publications of the Academy of Finland 1/11

3.5  Organic chemistry
All universities in the evaluation are pursuing research and teaching in the field of 
organic chemistry. This is very valuable, since organic chemistry has a key role in 
chemical and molecular sciences. Although not all universities have a separate 

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laboratory or other organisational unit, the subfield contributes to both educational 
programmes and the overall external funding of universities.
The level of instrumentation for organic chemistry research is at present good or 
very good, with all evaluated units having access to suitable major instruments, for 
example modern or quite modern nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectrometers, 
in addition to less expensive equipment. There is a concern that not enough funding 
will be present in the future for maintaining and possibly also further improving the 
current level of instrumental infrastructures, which is essential in order to keep up 
with the international competition. The panel recommends that researchers, 
universities and funding agencies jointly develop sustainable strategies for both major 
and minor instrument maintenance and investments.
Several research units or subunits are applying organic chemistry methods to 
certain groups of starting materials, and polymer and non-polymer wood origins are 
not uncommon. A common objective is to produce fine chemicals of interest to 
bioscience applications or to obtain knowledge of macromolecular structure. This 
general area of research has a long and successful tradition, and the research quality 
spans from excellent to acceptable. Wood-related chemistry with strong organic 
components is abundant in Finland, and the panel recommends that the actors 
strategically consider whether all current wood chemistry is correctly placed.
The units’ activities aiming at the determination of functional properties of other 
molecular, biomolecular and supramolecular systems using advanced spectroscopic, 
spectrometric and crystallographic methods are strong. The quality of these activities 
is excellent or outstanding particularly at units with high competence in both organic 
synthesis and advanced characterisation techniques.
Fundamental methods development and synthetic organic chemistry – the platform 
for all applications – are present but not equally strong at the evaluated units. Although 
the panel recognises that the active and mutually beneficial collaborations between the 
research units and chemical companies explain the focus on applied rather than basic 
research, this is a field that needs to become more proactive.
From an international perspective, several units are performing excellently but on 
too small total budgets. The panel recommends that activities in both fundamental 
and applied organic chemistry be strengthened at these units.
Some of the cross-disciplinary applied research at the evaluated units has 
international visibility, as has the highly fundamental research in methods 
development and new trends in catalysis. A common denominator for these units is a 
regular presence of international postdoctoral researchers, active for 1–2-year periods 
each and with worldwide recruitment.