Abstract
This has been a memorable Discussion, both for the quality of the science presented and for the tragic events that took place in New York and Washington while we were meeting. In order to add some context to the papers presented here, I should like to begin with a brief historical overview, focusing on some of the major meetings that have shaped the study of nonlinear chemical kinetics. This approach seems particularly appropriate in view of the role (see below) that this Discussion's predecessor, Faraday Symposium 9, played in the development of the field. Some history. Perhaps the first truly influential meeting on this topic was held in Prague in 1968.1 The Prague meeting helped to establish glycolysis, a system about which we have heard much at this Discussion, as the prototypical biological oscillator. At least as important was the opportunity for Western scientists to learn of an obscure reaction, discovered serendipitously in the Soviet Union, that had the ability to generate both temporal oscillation and spatial pattern formation. The Belousov–Zhabotinsky reaction soon became the workhorse and the prototype for the study of nonlinear chemical kinetics, a role which it continues to hold.
After the Prague meeting, interest in these fascinating reactions grew rapidly, and in 1974, Faraday Symposium 9 was organised by Peter Gray, who is here with us today, on the topic of “Physical Chemistry of Oscillatory Phenomena”.2 That Symposium generated a palpable sense of excitement, particularly among some of the younger researchers who attended. The organizers also displayed considerable perspicacity in their choice of papers. A strong case can be made that the structure of that meeting, with sessions on inorganic oscillators; thermokinetic oscillations; membranes, heterogeneous and biological systems; and theory of excitable media, laid out the structure of the field for the next several decades. In Table 1, I compare the numbers of papers in each area for Faraday Symposium 9 and Faraday Discussion 120. The similarity is remarkable; the shift away from inorganic toward biological and heterogeneous systems accurately reflects the direction of recent activity.