The Emanuele Paternò Collection of Historical Chemistry Instruments is located in the Emilio Segrè Department of Physics and Chemistry and houses laboratory equipment and apparatus used by chemists at the University of Palermo since the second half of the 19th century. The Collection consists of three exhibition rooms featuring laboratory benches and display cases in which the historical deviced are displayed.

Among the instruments on display, there are numerous two-arm balances equipped with boxes with weights in brass or rock crystal. The evolution of analytical instrumentation in the 19th century is demonstrated by the presence of two models of spectroscope used to perform accurate elemental analyses. Two models of Beckmann spectrophotometers for analysis in the visible UV, and one for analysis in the infrared, are also preserved. The optical instrumentation is completed by microscopes, polarimeters, refractometers and Duboscq colorimeters.

In a display case of the Collection are preserved some chemical products synthesized by Körner in 1867, which constitute decisive proof in favor of the equivalence of the six positions of the substituents in the benzene molecule.

The birth of the Collection is linked to the work of Stanislao Cannizzaro, who since his appointment as full professor of Organic and Inorganic Chemistry worked to ensure that the University of Palermo had a modern and functioning chemistry laboratory, intended for both research and practical exercises for students. The Collection preserves the traces of the prestigious international chemistry school that Cannizzaro was able to establish during his stay in Palermo, between 1862 and 1871. Nowadays the Collection is entitled to Emanuele Paternò di Sessa, who was an illustrious chemist, student and then collaborator of prof. Cannizzaro.

The Collection consists of three chemical benches and thirteen display cases. It houses around one hundred scientific instruments from the period between the second half of the 19th century and the end of the 20th century. Among the oldest scientific equipment, the Collection conserves fifteen balances with their relative weights. Furthermore, glass containers (or other materials, such as porcelain, wax, lead) used for the preparation, collection, conservation of solid, liquid or gaseous substances, to measure their volume, to heat them, to make them react are exhibited. The Collection also presents monographs and volumes of scientific journals, including the Gazzetta Chimica Italiana, published since the early 19th century.