Our mission is to increase the visibility of female organic chemists by creating and maintaining a database of women in the field.

We hope that organic chemistry, and all STEM fields, will one day achieve gender parity, but that advancement will not come without the efforts of those already in the field. That’s why we’ve created Female Organic Chemists and our database Female Organic Chemists in University Settings (FOCUS) to highlight women in the field of organic chemistry. FOCUS may serve as a reference for canvassing committees identifying candidates for award nominations, assist chemistry leaders in creating gender-balanced review panels, and create additional networking opportunities for young women in science.

The Female Organic Chemists in University Settings (FOCUS) database contains over 1,000 scientists representing over 50 countries. Due to the nature of our data collection, we believe that North America and western Europe are overrepresented in our database. We are currently compiling information about scientists from underrepresented regions and will update FOCUS regularly.