|
Brief Biography of Ronald E. Breslow
Education
B.A., Chemistry, Harvard University, 1952
M.A., Harvard University, 1954
Ph.D., Harvard University, 1955
Postdoctoral Research
NRC Fellow, Cambridge University, 1955
Ronald Breslow was born in Rahway, New Jersey on March 14, 1931.
He received his undergraduate and graduate training at Harvard University,
where he did his Ph.D. research with Professor R.B. Woodward. He
then spent a year in Cambridge, England as a postdoctoral fellow
with Lord Todd, and came to Columbia University in 1956 as Instructor
in Chemistry. He is now the Samuel Latham Mitchill Professor of
Chemistry at Columbia and one of twelve University Professors, and
a former Chairman of the Department.
Professor Breslow's research interests can be described generally
as involving the design and synthesis of new molecules with interesting
properties, and the study of these properties. Examples include
the cyclopropenyl cation, the simplest aromatic system and the first
aromatic compound prepared with other than six electrons in a ring
.
His work establishing the phenomenon of anti-aromaticity has involved
the synthesis of novel molecules, as well as their study. Even in
work on purely mechanistic questions, such as his discovery of the
chemical mechanism used by thiamine (vitamin B-1) in biochemical
reactions, the synthesis and study of novel molecules played an
important role.
Although he continues his interest in unusual conjugated systems,
his major emphasis in recent years has been on the synthesis and
study of molecules that imitate enzymatic reactions. This work has
included the development of remote functionalization reactions and
the development of artificial enzymes.
Recently he has developed a new group of cytodifferentiating agents
with potential use in cancer chemotherapy. He is the author of almost
400 publications.
Professor Breslow is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences
(Chairman of the Chemistry Division 1974-77), of the American Academy
of Arts and Sciences, and of the American Philosophical Society
(member of the Council, 1987-92), as well as other scientific societies
including the New York Academy of Sciences. He is a Foreign Fellow
of the Indian National Science Academy, an Honorary Member of the
Korean Chemical Society, , an Honorary Member of the Royal Society
of Chemistry of Great Britain, a Foreign Member of the Royal Society
of Britain, a Fellow of the World Innovation Foundation, and an
Honorary Member of the Chemical Society of Japan.
He has been the Chairman of the Board of Scientific Advisors of
the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, and a member of the Board of Trustees
of Rockefeller University. He is on the Editorial Board of a number
of Scientific Journals, and has held over 150 named and visiting
Professorships.
His major scientific awards include the American Chemical Society
Award in Pure Chemistry (1966), the Fresenius Award of Phi Lambda
Upsilon (1966), the Baekeland Medal (1969), the Centenary Medal
(1972), the Harrison Howe Award (1974), the Remsen Prize (1977),
the Roussel Prize in Steroids (1978), the James Flack Norris Prize
in Physical Organic Chemistry of the American Chemical Society (1980),
the Richards Medal (1984), the Arthur C. Cope Award (1987), the
Kenner Award (1988), the Nichols Medal (1989), the National Academy
of Sciences Award in Chemistry (1989), the Allan Day Award (1990),
the Paracelsus Award and Medal of the Swiss Chemical Society (1990),
and the U.S. National Medal of Science (1991). He was recently named
one of the top 75 contributors to the chemical enterprise in the
past 75 years by Chemical & Engineering News (1997), and won
the Priestley Medal (1999). In 2000 he won the New York City Mayor's
Award in Science and in 2002 he has received the ACS Bader Award
in Bioorganic or Bioinorganic Chemistry and the Esselen Award for
Chemistry in the Public Interest.
He has also received the Mark Van Doren Medal of Columbia University
and the Columbia University Great Teacher Award. He was President-Elect
of the American Chemical Society (1995), was ACS President (1996),
and was ACS Immediate Past President (1997).
Internet: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/chemistry/faculty/rcb.html
|
