Preface

In October of 2006, Thomas Manning traveled with a group of delegates from the American Chemical Society to the 27th Latin American Congress on Chemistry in Havana, Cuba, held on Oct. 16-20 at the Havana International Conference Center. (CEN, November 20, 2006, Volume 84, Number 47, p. 93, ¡Viva la Química!). During this visit he had an opportunity to meet several chemists that were faculty at universities and institutes throughout Cuba. From this scientific meeting collaboration was developed that allowed us to first participate in a joint class project involving a new exercise called Electronic Qualitative Analysis Schemes (EQAS, The Chemical Educator, 2007). The collaboration was extended first to an International Periodic Puzzle competition [1, 2] and then to this manuscript. TJM returned in 2009 to solidify the collaborations, also with a delegation from the ACS, headed by Julie Callahan, PhD the Global Network Content Development Manager for the ACS. TJM’s first trip to Cuba, in 2001, allowed him to tour the beautiful island nation in a trip organized by the University System of Georgia (USG) International office. www.valdosta.edu/~tmanning/cubausg