Honoring Karen L. WooleyTexas A&M University

Ralph & Helen

Banquet, Poster Session

& Symposium Friday, November 13, 2015

The Department of Chemistry at the University of Cincinnati and the Cincinnati Section of the American Chemical Society presents the

McMickenCollege of Arts & Sciences

‘15

The Ralph and Helen Oesper Award Karen Wooley, Texas A&M University is the recipient of the 2015 Oesper Award, the 35th in the series. Looking back over those 34 years, it is safe to say that this Award has endured and continues to gain recognition as a unique format for honoring our most outstanding chemists. The symposium associated with each award is composed of participants selected from former students, collaborators, and colleagues of the awardees, and are selected in close consultation with the recipient. The result of this process frequently is an extraordinary event in which one not only has an opportunity to hear presentations on the frontier of science, but also to learn about the professional and personal interactions that have brought us to that frontier. In any given year, the Oesper Symposium ranks with the most stimulating sessions to be found in chemistry. The 2016 Oesper Award will honor

Maurice Brookhart University of North Carolina

Maurice Brookhart is William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of Chemistry at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a member of National Academy of Sciences. His research encompasses synthetic and mechanistic organometallic chemistry and catalysis, with emphasis on the invention, synthesis, and study of new late-transition metal catalysts for olefin dimerization, polymerization reactions and C-H bond activation. Brookhart has about 300 publications and more than 20 patents. He has won numerous awards including ACS Award in Organometallic Chemistry, ACS Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award, ACS Award in Polymer Chemistry, and ACS Gabor A. Somorjai Award for Creative Research in Catalysis.

Previous Honorees 1981 Melvin Calvin (Nobel, 1961) 1982 John C. Sheehan 1983 Fred Basolo 1984 John A. Pople (Nobel, 1998) 1985 Fred McLafferty 1986 Henry Taube (Nobel, 1983) 1987 George C. Pimentel 1988 Konrad E. Bloch (Nobel, 1964; Medicine) 1989 Allen J. Bard 1990 Herbert C. Brown (Nobel, 1979) 1991 Derek H. R. Barton (Nobel, 1969) 1992 Walter H. Stockmayer 1993 James D. Winefordner 1994 Klaus Biemann 1995 Gregory Choppin 1996 Ralph N. Adams 1997 Rudolph A. Marcus (Nobel, 1992) 1998 Jerome A. Berson 1999 George S. Hammond 2000 Mildred Cohn 2001 Harry B. Gray 2002 Royce W. Murray 2003 Alan G. MacDiarmid (Nobel, 2000) 2004 George M. Whitesides 2005 V. Adrian Parsegian 2006 Richard N. Zare 2007 James P. Collman 2008 Alan G. Marshall 2009 Susan Lindquist 2010 Kurt Wüthrich (Nobel, 2002) 2011 Charles P. Casey 2012 Gary Hieftje 2013 Richard Eisenberg 2014 Isiah Warner

Dr. Ralph E. Oesper

Ralph Edward Oesper was born on June 14, 1886, in Cincinnati, Ohio. Entering the University of Cincinnati in 1904, he took his B.A. (1908), his M.A. (1909) and his Ph.D. (1914) degrees from the Chemistry Department under Lauder William Jones. After brief periods at New York University and Smith College, Oesper returned to the University of Cincinnati as a member of the chemistry faculty in 1918, where he remained until his retirement in 1951. However, this did not end his service to the University, as he continued to remain active as Professor Emeritus almost to the day of his death, 26 years later, at the age of 91. Oesper was a prolific writer, publishing more than 300 papers in the fields of analytical, organic, and colloid

chemistry, and especially in the history of chemistry. He also used his mastery of the German language to translate nearly two dozen books in these fields, as well as countless articles. He served on the editorial boards of the Journal of Chemical Education, Chymia, Mikrochemie, and Mikrochimica Acta. In recognition of his activities, he received the Eminent Chemist Award of the Cincinnati Section of the ACS, the Dexter Award in the History of Chemistry, The Cincinnati Chemist of the Year Award, and an honorary doctorate from the University of Cincinnati.

Oesper’s many interests and activities, as well as his dedication to the University of Cincinnati, are reflected in his bequest to the Department of Chemistry, which was made in both his name and that of his wife, Helen Wilson Oesper. The bequest has been used not only to establish the annual Oesper Symposium, but to establish a faculty position in Chemical Education and the History of Chemistry, to establish a scholarship for outstanding high school chemistry students, and to purchase new additions to the Oesper Collection of Rare Books and Portraits in the History of Chemistry, which consists of over 15,000 books and journals and nearly 2,000

photographs and prints relating to the history of chemistry. The department is also home to the Oesper Apparatus Museum, which houses over 6,000 artifacts.

The Oesper Collection of Rare Books and Portraits in the History of Chemistry

The 19th Century laboratory reconstruction in the Oesper Apparatus

The late Ralph E. Oesper (courtesy of the Oesper Collections,

University of Cincinnati)

Ralph & Helen Oesper Symposium

Friday, November 13, 2015 400-B/C Tangeman University Center

9:00-9:10

Anna D. Gudmundsdottir, Head, Dept. of Chemistry Welcome and Introductory Remarks

Session Chair: Neil Ayres

9:15-10:00

Anne J. McNeil, University of Michigan "Catalyst Transfer Polycondensation: Challenges and Opportunities"

Break (10:00-10:15 a.m)

Session Chair: Dave Smithrud

10:15- 11:00

E. W. “Bert” Meijer, Eindhoven University of Technology "From Supramolecular Polymers to Functional Systems"

11:00-11:45

Stuart J. Rowan, Case Western Reserve University "Using Dynamic Chemistry to Access Stimuli-Responsive Materials"

Break for lunch (11:50 – 1:00 p.m.)

850 Lindner - Faculty Club (only for those previously registered)

Session Chair: James Mack

1:15-2:00

Kazunori Kataoka, University of Tokyo "Supramolecular Nanosystems from Functionalized Block Copolymers for Smart Targeted Therapy of Intractable Diseases"

2:00-2:45

Samuel I. Stupp, Northwestern University "Bio-Inspired Supramolecular Materials"

Break (2:45–3:00 p.m)

Session Chair: Neil Ayres 3:00-3:45

Craig J. Hawker, University of California, Santa Barbara "Novel Chemical Building Blocks for Functional Material Platforms"

3:55-4:00

Introduction of Oesper Awardee: Neil Ayres

4:00-5:00

Karen L. Wooley, Texas A&M University "Natural Product-Based Engineering Polymers: A Special Emphasis Toward (Degradable) Materials for Orthopedic, Drug Delivery, and Other Applications"

5:30-7:00

Poster Session & Reception TUC Great Hall

7:00-8:00

ACS Banquet TUC Great Hall

8:00 Award Presentation, Announcements & After-dinner Speaker, Jean Fréchet, King Abdullah University, "From Corvallis to College Station"

Visit the Oesper website for more information: http://www.artsci.uc.edu/departments/chemistry/alumni-and-community/the-oesper-award-program-and-symposium.html

Anne J. McNeil

University of Michigan Anne J. McNeil is an Arthur F. Thurnau Professor and Associate Professor of Chemistry and Macromolecular Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Her research interests include chemical education, self-assembly, mechanism, catalysis and polymer science. She has garnered several research and teaching awards, including a Camille and Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award, Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship, Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, and the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Young Investigator Award. Prior to Michigan, she was a L’Oreal

Postdoctoral Fellow with Prof. Timothy M. Swager at MIT and a Ph.D. student with Prof. David B. Collum at Cornell University. She received her B.S. in Chemistry from the College of William and Mary.

Catalyst Transfer Polycondensation: Challenges and Opportunities

The 2004 discovery of a living, controlled chain-growth method for synthesizing π-conjugated polymers has ignited the field and led to the development of many new materials. Our work in this area has focused on: (i) gaining a mechanistic understanding of the chain-growth process, (ii) polymerizing alternative monomers, and (iii) synthesizing previously inaccessible materials, including gradient copolymers. This seminar will highlight a few short stories within each area, including efforts to (i) selectively accelerate initiation, (ii) polymerize an electron-deficient monomer, and (iii) stabilize P3HT/fullerene solar cells using gradient copolymers as compatibilizers.

E.W. Meijer

Eindhoven University of Technology E.W. “Bert” Meijer is Distinguished University Professor in the Molecular Sciences, Professor of Organic Chemistry at the Eindhoven University of Technology and scientific director of the Institute for Complex Molecular Systems. After receiving his PhD degree at the University of Groningen, he worked for 10 years in industry (Philips and DSM). In 1991 he was appointed in Eindhoven, while in the meantime he has held part-time positions in Nijmegen and Santa Barbara, CA. Bert Meijer is a member of many editorial advisory boards, including Advanced Materials,

Angewandte Chemie, and the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Bert Meijer has received a number of awards, including the Spinoza Award in 2001, the ACS Award for Polymer Chemistry in 2006, the AkzoNobel Science Award 2010, the International Award of the Society of Polymer Science Japan in 2011, the Cope Scholar Award of the ACS in 2012, and the Prelog medal in 2014. He is a member of a number of academies and societies, including the Royal Netherlands Academy of Science, where he is appointed to Academy Professor in 2014.

From Supramolecular Polymers to Functional Systems

The intriguing prospects of molecular electronics, nanotechnology, biomaterials, and the aim to close the gap between synthetic and biological molecular systems are important ingredients to study the cooperative action of molecules in the self-assembly towards functional supramolecular systems. The design and synthesis of well-defined supramolecular polymers requires a balanced choice between covalent synthesis and the self-assembly of the fragments prepared. The current self-assembly processes are primarily controlled by solvent, temperature or concentration. For synthetic chemists, the non-covalent synthesis of these supramolecular architectures is regarded as one of the most challenging objectives in science: How far can we push chemical self-assembly and can we get control over the kinetic instabilities of the non-covalent architectures made? How can we go from self-assembly to self-organization? Where the number of different components is increasing the complexity of the system is increasing as well. Mastering this complexity is a prerequisite to achieve the challenges in creating functional systems. In the lecture we illustrate our approach using a number of examples out of our own laboratories, with the aim to come to new strategies for multi-step non-covalent synthesis of functional supramolecular systems.

Stuart J. Rowan

Case Western Reserve University

Stuart Rowan is currently the Kent H. Smith Professor of Engineering in the Department of Macromolecular Science and Engineering at Case Western Reserve University. He has secondary appointments in both Biomedical Engineering and Chemistry at Case Western Reserve University. In addition, he is currently the faculty director of the Institute for Advanced Materials (IAM@Case), Stuart was born in Edinburgh, Scotland and grew up in Troon, Aryshire on the west coast of Scotland. He received his B.Sc. (Hons.) in Chemistry in 1991 from the University of Glasgow and stayed there for graduate school in the laboratory of Dr

David D. MacNicol, receiving his Ph.D. in 1995. In 1994 he moved to the Chemistry Department at the University of Cambridge to work with Prof. Jeremy K. M. Sanders FRS. He moved across the Atlantic (and the continental U.S.) to continue his postdoctoral studies with Prof. J. Fraser Stoddart FRS at the University of California, Los Angeles (now Northwestern) in 1998. In 1999 he was appointed as an Assistant Professor to the Department of Macromolecular Science and Engineering at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in 2005 and became a Full Professor in 2008. He is a NSF CAREER awardee, received the Morley Medal (ACS) in 2013, the CWRU Distinguished University Award in 2015, the Herman Mark Scholar Award (ACS) in 2015 and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry. He is the Deputy Editor of the ACS Macro Letters, and on the editorial advisory board for the Journal of Polymer Science Part A: Polymer Chemistry, Chemical Science, and J. Macromolecular Sci, Pure & Applied Chem. He has published over 130 scientific papers and reviews. His research interests focus on the potential of dynamic chemistry (covalent and non-covalent) in the construction and properties of structurally dynamic polymeric materials. His group works on supramolecular polymers, self-healing materials, stimuli-responsive material and nanocomposites, metal-containing polymers, gels, biomaterials, and developing new synthetic methods for the construction of complex polymeric architectures.

Using Dynamic Chemistry to Access Stimuli-Responsive Materials The dynamic bond can be defined as any class of bond that selectively undergoes reversible breaking and reformation, usually under equilibrium conditions. The incorporation of dynamic bonds (which can be either covalent or non-covalent) allows access to structurally dynamic polymers. Such polymers can exhibit macroscopic responses upon exposure to an environmental stimulus, on account of a rearrangement of the polymeric architecture. In such systems the nature of the dynamic bond not only dictates which stimulus the material will be responsive to but also plays a role in the response itself. Thus such a design concept represents a molecular level approach to the development of new stimuli-responsive materials. We have been interested in the potential of such systems to access new material platforms and have developed a range of new mechanically stable, structurally dynamic polymer films that change their properties in response to a given stimulus, such as temperature, light or specific chemicals. Such adaptive materials have been targeted toward applications that include healable plastics, responsive liquid crystalline polymers, chemical sensors, thermally responsive hydrogels, shape memory materials and mechanically dynamic biomedical implants. Our latest results in this area will be discussed.

Kazunori Kataoka

University of Tokyo Kazunori Kataoka, Ph.D. is Professor of Biomaterials at Graduate School of Engineering, the University of Tokyo, Japan. He has been appointed joint position since 2004 from Graduate School of Medicine, the University of Tokyo as Professor of Clinical Biotechnology at Center of Disease Biology and Integrative Medicine. Dr. Kataoka received several awards, including the Society Award from the Society of Polymer Science, Japan (2000), Clemson Award from the Society for Biomaterials USA (2005), Founder’s Award from the Controlled Release Society (2008), Humboldt Research Award (2012), Leo Esaki Prize (2012), and Gutenberg Research Award (2015). He served as the president of Controlled Release Society (2012-13). His current major research interest is supramolecular materials for nanobiotechnology, particularly focusing on drug and

gene targeting, and has published more than 500 papers with high citations as selected as “Highly-Cited Researchers” by Thomson Reuters.

Supramolecular Nanosystems from Functionalized Block

Copolymers for Smart Targeted Therapy of Intractable Diseases Nanotechnology-based medicine (Nanomedicine) has received progressive interest for the treatment of intractable diseases, such as cancer, as well as for the non-invasive diagnosis through various imaging modalities. Engineered polymeric nanosystems with smart functions play a key role in nanomedicine as drug carriers, gene vectors, and imaging probes. This presentation focuses present status and future trend of the development of self-assembled nanosystems from block copolymers for the therapy of intractable diseases. Nanosystems with 10 to 100 nm in size can be prepared by programmed self-assembly of block copolymers in aqueous entity. Most typical example is polymeric micelles with distinctive core-shell architecture. Several micellar formulations of antitumor drugs have been intensively studied in preclinical and clinical trials, and their utility has been demonstrated. Compared with conventional formulations, such as liposomes, polymeric micelles have several advantages, including controlled drug release, tissue penetrating ability and reduced toxicity. Critical features of the polymeric micelles as drug carriers, including particle size, stability, and loading capacity and release kinetics of drugs, can be modulated by the structures and physicochemical properties of the constituent block copolymers. The development of smart polymeric micelles that dynamically change their properties due to sensitivity to chemical or physical stimuli is the most

promising trend toward nanomedicines, directing to the targeting therapy with high efficacy and ensured safety. Notable anti-tumor efficacy against intractable cancer, including pancreatic cancer, of antitumor drug-incorporated polymeric micelles with pH-responding property was demonstrated to emphasize a promising utility of nanomedicines for cancer treatment. Versatility in drug incorporation is another feasibility of polymeric micelles. Polymeric micelles loaded with oligonucleotides, including siRNA, have been successfully formulated with relevant properties for nanotherapeutics, such as penetrability into diseased sites in the body to reveal significant silencing of disease-related genes by simple systemic injection. These results demonstrate the promising features of polymeric micelles as platform nanosystems for molecular therapy of various intractable diseases through the selective delivery of a variety of drugs having issues on pharmacokinetics and phramacodynamics.

Samuel I. Stupp

Northwestern University Samuel Stupp obtained his B.S. in chemistry at the University of California at Los Angeles and his Ph.D. in materials science and engineering at Northwestern University. He spent 18 years at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he was the Swanlund Professor of Materials Science, Chemistry, and Bioengineering. In 1999, he joined the faculty at Northwestern as Board of Trustees Professor of Materials Science and Engineering, Chemistry, and Medicine. He is currently the Director of Northwestern’s Simpson Querrey Institute for

BioNanotechnology and of the Center for Bio-Inspired Energy Science, which is funded by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Frontier Research Center program. Professor Stupp is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Spanish Royal Academy. He is also a fellow of the American Physical Society, the Materials Research Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the World Technology Network, and the World Biomaterials Congress. His awards include, the Department of Energy Prize for Outstanding Achievement in Materials Chemistry, Humboldt Senior Award from Germany, the Materials Research Society Medal Award, the American Chemical Society Award in Polymer Chemistry, the Sir Edward Youde Memorial Award in Hong Kong, the American Chemical Society Ronald Breslow Award for Achievement in Biomimetic Chemistry, the International Award from The Society of Polymer Science in Japan, and Honorary Doctorates from Eindhoven University, University of Gothenburg, and the National University of Costa Rica. He has served in many scientific advisory boards and committees including, the Department of Energy Basic Energy Sciences, Baxter, RIKEN Institute, University of Vienna, Sweden’s BIOMATCELL Center for Biomaterials and Cell Therapies, Ecole Supérieure de Physique et de Chemie in Paris, and the Institute for Bioengineering in Catalonia, Spain. He holds distinguished visiting positions in Eindhoven, Singapore, and Hong Kong and his research is focused on materials for medicine and energy covering the fields of supramolecular chemistry, self-assembly of materials, solar photovoltaics, solar fuels, regenerative medicine, and nanomedicine for cardiovascular and cancer therapies.

Bio-Inspired Supramolecular Materials Supramolecular soft matter has the potential to mimic the structures and dynamics of biological systems, and it is therefore a rich platform for the development of bio-inspired materials. The interesting features of supramolecular soft materials include, nanoscale control of dynamics, highly responsive behavior to external stimuli, capacity to self-heal defects, noncovalent co-localization of functional domains, and the use of self-assembly to optimize function, among many others. This lecture will first describe supramolecular soft materials that mimic the photosynthetic machinery of plants by integrating the necessary functions to generate solar fuels. In these systems light harvesting structures are co-localized with catalysts for hydrogen production in highly hydrated environments that enhance their function. Other energy relevant examples will be described in which supramolecular systems integrate electron donors and acceptors for photovoltaic behavior or ferroelectric response. As a third topic, the lecture will discuss the development of highly dynamic bioactive supramolecular materials designed to interact with cells in order to trigger biological adhesion and signaling pathways relevant to regenerative medicine.

Craig J. Hawker

University of California, Santa Barbara Professor Craig J. Hawker, FRS is Clarke Professor and holds the Alan and Ruth Heeger Chair of Interdisciplinary Science at UCSB where he directs the California Nanosystems Institute and the Materials Research Laboratory. He came to UCSB in 2004 after eleven years as a Research Staff Member at the IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose, CA. Prior to this he attended the University of Queensland, Australia in 1981 and received his undergraduate degree in Chemistry. After graduating, Craig went to the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom to study the biosynthesis of Vitamin B12 under

Prof. Sir A. R. Battersby. Upon finishing his doctorate, Craig ventured to the United States to do his post-doctoral work with Professor J.M.J. Frechet at Cornell University. Professor Hawker’s research activities focus on synthetic polymer chemistry and nanotechnology, integrating fundamental studies with the development of nanostructured materials for advanced properties and functions in microelectronics and biotechnology. This work has led to over 400 peer-reviewed papers and 50 patents with a number of materials being commercialized. He has helped establish a range of start-up companies - Relypsa, Intermolecular, Olaplex, Tricida – serving as both Founder and Scientific Advisor. For his pioneering studies, Professor Hawker’s recent honors include the 2013 American Chemical Society Award in Polymer Chemistry, the 2012 Centenary Prize from the Royal Society of Chemistry and an Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award from the American Chemical Society in 2011. Professor Hawker has been honored with election to the Royal Society (2010) as well as being named a Fellow of the American Chemical Society and the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Novel Chemical Building Blocks for Functional Material Platforms The self-assembly and directed functionalization of polymeric materials is a promising platform for the “bottom-up” fabrication of nanostructured systems. In designing such nanostructures, the molecular characteristics and functional groups of the chemical building blocks dictate the assembly process and are therefore critical in the formation of various structures. This feature will be illustrated with examples ranging from new strategies for the fabrication of nanostructured particles to novel hydrogels and surface coating inspired by marine organisms.

Karen L. Wooley

Texas A&M University

Karen L. Wooley received a Bachelors of Science degree in Chemistry from Oregon State University in 1988 and then studied under the direction of Professor Jean M. J. Fréchet at Cornell University, obtaining a Ph.D. in polymer/organic chemistry in 1993. She then began an academic career as an Assistant Professor of Chemistry at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, was promoted in 1999 to Full Professor with tenure, was installed as a James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor in Arts & Sciences in 2006, and in 2007, received an appointment in the School of Medicine,

Department of Radiology. In July 2009, Karen relocated to Texas A&M University, where she has undertaken a professorship in the Department of Chemistry, as the W. T. Doherty-Welch Chair in Chemistry, with a joint appointment in the Department of Chemical Engineering. Prof. Wooley’s research interests include the synthesis and characterization of degradable polymers, unique macromolecular architectures and complex polymer assemblies, and the design and development of well-defined nanostructured materials. The development of novel synthetic strategies, fundamental study of the materials’ properties, and their applications for the diagnosis and treatment of disease or for performance as non-toxic anti-biofouling coatings are particular foci of her research activities.

Natural Product-Based Engineering Polymers:

A Special Emphasis Toward (Degradable) Materials for Orthopedic, Drug Delivery, and Other Applications

A primary interest in the Wooley laboratory is the production of functional polymers from renewable sources that are capable of reverting to those natural products once their purpose has been served. This presentation will highlight synthetic strategies for the development of polymer materials, which can be produced by relatively simple approaches from complex polyhydroxyl natural products and can be made to exhibit a range of properties, based upon the monomeric building blocks and, typically, carbonate or phosphoester linkages. Although Nature has several examples of engineering-type construction materials (e.g. cellulose, chitin, etc.) that are degradable, resorbable and recyclable, most synthetic materials are designed to be derived from renewable resources and degradable or from petrochemicals and perform as an engineering material. In one direction, polyhydroxyl natural products as the monomeric building blocks are

combined with carbonates, found in common engineering materials, as the linkages, for which hydrolytic degradation is expected to produce the polyhydroxyl compound plus carbon dioxide. Four classes of natural monomers, D-glucose, quinic acid, ferulic acid and quercetin, are being evaluated for the construction of polycarbonates. The polyhydroxyl natural product monomers provide reactive hydroxyl groups for establishment of the polycarbonate backbones and their rigid cyclic core units together with the polar, hydrogen-bonding hydroxyl groups in the resulting polycarbonates are expected to lead to strong and tough materials for engineering, biomedical and other applications, where the combined properties and degradation potential can be utilized. In a second direction, phosphoester linkages are utilized, again borrowing from Nature, in the use of phosphoesters commonly found in biological macromolecules, such as DNA or RNA. Polyphosphoester-based block copolymers that can be produced rapidly and then undergo multiple chemical transformations and direct assembly in water into functional nanomaterials are serving as a platform for several directions toward their development as biomedical devices for the treatment of lung infections and osteosarcoma lung metastases. If time allows, recent developments toward the preparation of functional polypeptides and their assemblies will also be described. As this work is in progress, it is expected that the physical, mechanical, supramolecular assembly and stability properties will be tuned by the chemical compositions and structures, controlled by the advancement of synthetic methodologies by which to prepare such materials.

Ralph & Helen Oesper Award Banquet & Poster Session Friday, November 13, 2015 Great Hall, Tangeman University Center

5:30 – 7:00 p.m. Poster Session/Social 7:00 p.m. Banquet 8:00 p.m. Announcements & Award Presentation 8:15 p.m. After Dinner Speaker, Jean Fréchet, King Abdullah University

“From Corvallis to College Station!”

Jean Fréchet

King Abdullah University Jean Fréchet is Vice President for Research at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology. Professor Fréchet received his first university degree at the Institut de Chimie et Physique Industrielles in France, before going to the United States for graduate studies in organic and polymer chemistry at Syracuse University and the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry. He joined the Chemistry Faculty at the University of Ottawa in Canada in 1973 and remained there until 1987, when he became IBM Professor of Polymer Chemistry at Cornell University. In 1995 he was named the Peter J. Debye Chair of Chemistry at Cornell University in the United States. In 1997, he joined the Chemistry Faculty at the University of California, Berkeley and was named the Henry Rapoport Chair of Organic Chemistry in 2003. While at Berkeley, he also served as a principal investigator in the Materials Science Division of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the Scientific Director of the Organic and Macromolecular Facility for the Molecular Foundry at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. His numerous awards and honors include the Japan Prize and multiple recognitions from the American Chemical Society, including the Arthur C. Cope Award, and awards in Polymer Chemistry and Applied Polymer Science. Professor Fréchet is a member of the US National Academy of Sciences, the US National Academy of Engineering, the American Academy of Arts and Science, and the Academy of Europe.

From Corvallis to College Station

While only a small part of it takes place along famed highway 66, this adventure is well worth recounting from its start in beautiful Oregon - some time in a bygone century - to the heart of the Brazos Valley in 2015.