The Faculty of Industrial Chemistry - the only one in Italy - is situated at the foot of Bologna’s hills, not far from the city’s historic centre. The institution, which has recently celebrated its 60th anniversary since its foundation, was created with the intention of giving rise to a new flexible type of graduate, ranging from the education of a chemical engineer to that of a chemical scientist.
Almost a quarter of all the Italian graduates in Industrial Chemistry have been trained by the Faculty in Bologna. The excellent relations between lecturers and students and the high quality services available (learning and research laboratories, libraries, computer rooms, and multimedia language laboratories) assure a good provision of education and training that are essential in today's job market.
The final year of the second cycle degree courses is partially dedicated to the drafting of an experimental degree dissertation in the research laboratories of the Faculty Departments. Here the student works on original research topics and can make use of highly sophisticated and advanced technologies. All the studies produced (about 200 paper a year) are published in the most leading scientific magazines at an international level.
Historical Background
The University of Bologna’s Faculty of Industrial Chemistry was inaugurated on 14 January 1922 under the original title of "Reale Scuola Superiore di Chimica Industriale" . The School was backed by a committee of promoters founded in 1916, upon the initiative of Attilio Muggia, the then President of the Association of Engineers in Bologna.
The need to set up a school of Industrial Chemistry was strongly felt at the time in order to free Italy from its strong reliance upon foreign companies in terms of industrial products, as well as to encourage the development of the Italian industrial chemical sector so as to satisfy the country’s industrial requirements and to become competitive at the international level. The acknowledgement of the Italian chemical industry’s inferiority as compared with the foreign chemical industry, and in particular when compared to German industry, soon became evident at the outbreak of the First World War, when the importing of various chemical products for the following industrial sectors was interrupted: glass-making, pharmaceuticals, dyes, metallurgy, concrete-making, fertilizer production, paper-making, agricultural and wine production, etc., which at the time were not well developed if compared to their theoretical potential.
The "Scuola Superiore di Chimica Industriale" was thus expected to educate and train a large number of chemists and chemical scientists, capable of enhancing the activities of the chemical sector in Italian industry. As a matter of fact, Italian industry has always lacked a close-knit relationship between science and industry. Particular importance has been given to the laboratory activities and to cooperation projects between school and industry, so that companies could benefit from the regular replacement of skilled and qualified technicians. One of the School’s specific research areas has been the production of enzymes, competing with the German sector, with the setting up of specific courses.
The choice of Bologna as the location for the "Higher School of Industrial Chemistry" was determined by the fact that the city was at the heart of the important industrial area of the Emilia region, where the need for scientific development applied to industry and agriculture was greater and the academic context appeared to promise better results.