Foreword to the special virtual issue in tribute to Jerry P. Jasinski

When people think of science and scientists, often the picture of a lone genius, or of a renaissance man comes to mind. Somebody who, being extraordinary but not well understood, overcomes all obstacles on their own. Such times, even if we cherish the thought, are long gone. Today science, and crystallography even more so than most, is done in collaboration, with teams of people spanning many universities, countries, and continents, with each member contributing their unique abilities, joining together to solve today's challenges. Alone, we are little compared to what we can achieve together.

Even among those masses that are each a small wheel that keeps the gears moving, there are unique and extraordinary people who stand out. People like Jerry P. Jasinski. People who take collaboration and service for others to a new level. Crystallography is, by its nature, something rarely done in a vacuum; most crystallographers routinely work and collaborate with others. But even in this field, Jerry Jasinski has been one of a kind. Those who knew him can confirm, he never said no when asked for help. He always stepped in, helped out, explained how things worked, and sparked the curiosity of others. The people Jerry worked with spanned the globe. From colleagues in the US, just down the road from Keene State, to research groups from dozens of countries from all inhabited continents of this planet.

Jerry was born in Newport, New Hampshire, obtained his BA from the University of New Hampshire, did graduate work at UNH and Worcester Polytechnic Institute and obtained his PhD from the University of Wyoming. He worked as a secondary school teacher of chemistry and physics in New York, Vermont and New Hampshire, and eventually started as an Assistant Professor of Chemistry at Keene State College in 1978, where he remained for the rest of his career. In 1989, Jerry established the New England Molecular Structure Center with NSF funding, and thereafter established a framework for others to follow on doing crystallographic research at an undergraduate institution. His accomplishments are too long to list (Butcher, 2022), but his impact is evident on all who worked with him.

Jerry was known throughout the New England chemistry community, most notably as Chair of the Northeastern Section of the American Chemical Society and the president of the New England Institute of Chemists. Beyond his very active involvement in professional societies, Jerry was known by all he interacted with as a caring and selfless man who would gladly put out his hand to help others. He touched chemists in High Schools, students and teachers, in Universities, students and faculty, and took special pride in helping younger chemists progress. His kind heart and boisterous laugh will be sadly missed.

Jerry was a prolific scientific author and a strong contributor to Acta Crystallographica, having published 365 articles in this journal alone! He also served as a Co-editor from 2009–2012 and was always happy to help authors to improve their submissions. To honor his memory, and the special relationship he had with IUCr journals and especially with Acta Crystallographica Section E, we assembled a list of Jerry's friends, colleagues and collaborators and invited them to contribute research communications to this special tribute issue (https://journals.iucr.org/special_issues/2022/Jasinski/index.html). The response that we received from the community was enthusiastic. The contributions to Acta Cryst. E included submissions not only from across the United States, but also from international collaborators in India, Morocco, Egypt and Ukraine. In the spirit of Jerry supporting chemists throughout their careers, the list of authors includes chemists at all stages, from a high school student to emeritus faculty. We were especially pleased to see that four of the articles had direct contributions from Jerry himself, as well as some of his former students and postdocs from Keene State College. The topical coverage of the articles spans the full spectrum of non-biological crystallography, including organic and main-group compounds (Thiruvalluvar et al., 2021; Mahesha et al., 2021; Allah et al., 2021; Malla et al., 2022; Rajegowda et al., 2021; Purdy et al., 2021), complexes of transition metals and lanthanides (Addison et al., 2022; Frey et al., 2021; Ullery et al., 2021; Sghyar et al., 2021; Tinapple et al., 2021; Mikhalyova et al., 2022; Pavlischuk et al., 2021), transition metal and actinide clusters (Park et al., 2022; Patel et al., 2022; Kelley et al., 2021), and coordination polymers (Lobana et al., 2022). It also includes two articles (Foxman, 2021; Zheng & Campbell, 2021) first published as part of the `Modern approaches and tools for teaching crystallography' special issue in Acta E that describe the tutorial for teaching space groups and crystallographic symmetry that Jerry developed with Bruce Foxman.

As a further indication of the scope of Jerry's research and the affection in which he was held by collaborators around the world, this special issue is being published in parallel with another in the Journal of Chemical Crystallography. The papers in that journal reflect more of Jerry's scientific interests including copper compounds, 1,2,4-triazoles, hydrogen and halogen bonding and other interactions, computational studies and pharmaceuticals (Amaral et al., 2022; Baraskar et al., 2022; Bhattacharjee et al., 2021; Boehm et al., 2022; Bülbül et al., 2021; Davies et al., 2022; Elshani et al., 2022; Kumari et al., 2022; Lobana et al., 2021; Lopez et al., 2021; Peloquin et al., 2022; Satheesh et al., 2022; Singh et al., 2022).

We are grateful to everyone who contributed to the special issues, and happy to see such a strong response for someone who was such an integral part of our community.