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Diversity in Chemistry

Norbert Rillieux pioneered an important sugar processing with the invention of the multiple effect evaporator.

Rillieux’s invention made it possible to produce sugar at a lower cost and with reduced man power.

The Rillieux evaporator is still used today in sugar production in addition to the production of condensed milk, soap, and glue.

Source: Norbert Rillieux (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norbert_Rillieux; American Chemical Society National Historic Chemical Landmarks. Norbert Rillieux and a Revolution in Sugar Processing. http://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/education/whatischemistry/landmarks/norbertrillieux.html.

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Diversity in Chemistry

In 1877, Julia Lermontova moved to Moscow, and began working in Markovnikov's lab, in oil research.

She was the first woman to work in this area of research.

The Butlerov-Eltekov-Lermontova reaction is an organic reaction which allows for the addition of branches onto hydrocarbons.

Source: Julia Lermontova (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_Lermontova

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Diversity in Chemistry

Vera Yevstafievna Popova was a Russian chemist. She was one of the first female chemists in Russia, and the first Russian female author of a chemistry textbook.

She "probably became the first woman to die in the cause of chemistry" as a result of an explosion in her laboratory which occurred while she was attempting to synthesize H-C≡P (methylidynephosphane), a chemical similar to hydrogen cyanide.

Source: Vera Yevstafievna Popova (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vera_Yevstafievna_Popova.

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Astrid Cleve published four chemistry papers, all of which concerned nitrogenous organic chemicals in varying structures.

From 1898 to 1902, she was employed as an assistant professor of chemistry at the Chemical Institution at Stockholms högskola (later Stockholm University) which proved progressive in its willingness to hire women.

Source: Astrid Cleve (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astrid_Cleve.

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Diversity in Chemistry

St. Elmo Brady is the first African American to receive a Ph.D. in chemistry in the United States—earned from the University of Illinois in 1912.

After completing his doctoral degree, Brady taught at historically black universities, including Tuskegee Institute, Howard University, Fisk University, and Tougaloo College, leaving an impressive teaching legacy of strong undergraduate and graduate chemistry programs.

Source: St. Elmo Brady (American Chemical Society). https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/education/whatischemistry/african-americans-in-sciences/st--elmo-brady.html

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Diversity in Chemistry

Salimuzzaman Siddiqui is credited for pioneering the isolation of unique chemical compounds from the Neem (Azadirachta indica), Rauwolfia, and various other flora.

He revolutionized the research on pharmacology of various domestic plants found in South Asia to extract novel chemical substances of medicinal importance.

Siddiqui published more than 300 research papers and obtained 40 patents mainly from the field of natural product chemistry.

Source: Salimuzzaman Siddiqui (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salimuzzaman_Siddiqui.

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Listed among the ingredients of countless foods, such as salad dressing, ice cream, canned soup, and condiments, is a mysterious-sounding substance called xanthan gum.

This groundbreaking product and a process for producing it in large quantities was discovered in the 1950s by chemist Allene Rosalind Jeanes.

It has since become an indispensable thickening and texturizing agent not only for foods but also for a wide range of cosmetic, automotive, and healthcare products.

Source: Allene Jeanes – Xanthum Gum (Lemens N-MIT). https://lemelson.mit.edu/resources/allene-jeanes.

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Diversity in Chemistry

In 1942 while on leave from teaching during World War II, Anna J. Harrison conducted secret wartime research at the University of Missouri. In 1944, she conducted research on toxic smoke for the National Defense Research Committee.

This work was instrumental in the creation of smoke-detecting field kits for the United States Army.

At Mount Holyoke College, Harrison's research focused on the structure of organic compounds and their interaction with light, particularly in the ultraviolet and far ultraviolet bands.

Source: Anna J. Harrison (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_J._Harrison.

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Samuel Proctor Massie was as one of the few African American scientists to work on the Manhattan Project during World War II.

Samuel Proctor Massie is noted for his work on drugs to combat cancer, mental diseases, malaria, meningitis, and herpes.

He received a patent for work he did combating gonorrhea.

Source: Absher, A. (2011, July 25). Samuel P. Massie (1919-2005). BlackPast.org. https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/massie-samuel-proctor-1919-2005/

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Diversity in Chemistry

Luis Miramontes science contributions are extensive, including numerous publications and nearly 40 patents in different areas such as organic chemistry, pharmaceutical chemistry, petrochemistry and atmospheric chemistry and polluting agents.

When Miramontes was only 26 years old, of norethisterone (norethindrone), that was to become the progestin used in one of the first three oral contraceptives (combined oral contraceptive pills).

Source: Luis Miramontes (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_E._Miramontes.

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Osamu Shimomura is a Japanese organic chemist and marine biologist.

He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2008 for the discovery and development of green fluorescent protein (GFP) with two American scientists: Martin Chalfie of Columbia University and Roger Tsien of the University of California-San Diego.

Source: Osamu Shimomura (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osamu_Shimomura .

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Dr. John R. Cooper has several patents in development of fluorine-rubber compounds that are resistant to heat which have applications for seals in jet engines.

He received a Bachelor of Science degree from Yale University in 1952 and was awarded a doctoral degree in Organic Chemistry from the University of Cincinnati four years later.

Source: John R. Cooper (American Chemical Society). https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/education/whatischemistry/african-americans-in-sciences/john-r--cooper.html

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Irina Petrovna Beletskaya is a professor of chemistry at Moscow State University. She specializes in organometallic chemistry and its application to problems in organic chemistry.

She is best known for her studies on aromatic reaction mechanisms, as well as work on carbanion acidity and reactivity.

She developed some of the first methods for carbon-carbon bond formation using palladium or nickel catalysts, and extended these reactions to work in aqueous media.

Source: Irina Beletskaya (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irina_Beletskaya.

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Jean'ne Shreeve has spent much of her career advocating for women chemists and research into fluorine chemistry.

Throughout her career, Shreeve has published 468 scientific papers and earned one patent.

She is known for working with highly energetic nitrogenous and fluoridated compounds, and created syntheses for a variety of widely used rocket propellant oxidizers.

Source: Jean’ne Shreeve (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean%27ne_Shreeve and Jean’ne Shreeve Chemistry Inventor (Inventricity) http://www.inventricity.com/jeanne-shreeve-chemist-inventor

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Ryōji Noyori won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2001, he shared the prize with William S. Knowles for the study of chirally catalyzed hydrogenations; the second third of the prize went to K. Barry Sharpless for his study in chirally catalyzed oxidation reactions.

Noyori is most famous for asymmetric hydrogenation using as catalysts complexes of rhodium and ruthenium, particularly those based on the BINAP ligand.

The antibacterial agent levofloxacin is manufactured by asymmetric hydrogenation of ketones in the presence of a Ru(II) BINAP halide complex.

Source: Ryōji Noyori (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ry%C5%8Dji_Noyori .

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Darshan Ranganathan was an organic chemist from India who was known for her work in bio-organic chemistry, including "pioneering work in protein folding."

She created a protocol which achieved the autonomous reproduction of imidazole, an ingredient of histadine and histamine with pharmaceutical importance.

As her career developed, she became a specialist in designing proteins to hold a wide variety of different conformations and designing nanostructures using self-assembling peptides.

Source: Darshan Ranganathan (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darshan_Ranganathan .

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Antonio M. Echavarren Pablos is a Spanish chemist who has contributed to the recent advances in gold and palladium chemistry.

Example:

Gold-Catalyzed Reactions via Cyclopropyl Gold Carbene-like Intermediates

Source: Antonio M. Echavarren (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_M._Echavarren; https://alchetron.com/Antonio-M-Echavarren

Cycloisomerizations of 1,n-enynes catalyzed by gold(I) proceed via electrophilic species with a highly distorted cyclopropyl gold(I) carbene-like structure, which can react with different nucleophiles to form a wide variety of products by attack at the cyclopropane or the carbene carbons. Particularly important are reactions in which the gold(I) carbene reacts with alkenes to form cyclopropanes either intra- or intermolecularly. In the absence of nucleophiles, 1,n-enynes lead to a variety of cycloisomerized products including those resulting from skeletal rearrangements. Reactions proceeding through cyclopropyl gold(I) carbene-like intermediates are ideally suited for the bioinspired synthesis of terpenoid natural products by the selective activation of the alkyne in highly functionalized enynes or polyenynes.

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Amir H. Hoveyda studies asymmetric catalysis, and is particularly noted for his work on developing catalysts for asymmetric olefin metathesis.

In recent years he has worked extensively with N-heterocyclic carbenes as ligands. His research also focuses on copper-catalyzed allylic alkylations and conjugate additions using these ligands.

Source: Amir H. Hoveyda (Wikipedia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amir_H._Hoveyda.

Design, synthesis, characterization, and catalytic activity of six enantiomerically pure Ru-based metathesis catalysts are disclosed (3a−3f). The new chiral catalysts were prepared through steric and electronic alterations of the parent catalyst system (3). The present studies indicate that the effect of structural modifications of chiral complex 3 does not always correspond to those of the related achiral complexes. The present findings illustrate that modified Ru complexes (3e and 3f) deliver reactivity levels that are more than 2 orders of magnitude higher than 3. Reactivity and physical data are provided that shed light on the origin of activity differences. Some members of the new generation of chiral Ru catalysts promote asymmetric ring-opening (AROM) and ring-closing (ARCM) metatheses that cannot be effected by the first generation chiral catalyst (3).

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M. Christina White developed the first synthetically useful methane monooxygenase (MMO) mimic system for catalytic epoxidations with hydrogen peroxide.

Her group's research interests center around the development of highly selective C—H functionalization methods for streamlining the process of complex molecule synthesis.

Source: M. Christine White. (University of Illinois) http://www.scs.illinois.edu/white/index.php?p=mcw_bio .

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Melanie Sanford is best known for her studies of high-valent organopalladium species, particularly those implicated in Pd-catalyzed C–H functionalization reactions.

Source: Melanie Sanford. (Wikipedia) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanie_Sanford; http://umich.edu/~mssgroup/people.html

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Abigail Doyle’s group identified catalytic cross-coupling reactions with styrenyl epoxides and aziridines as electrophiles and pioneered several other important transformations using Ni-based catalysts.

Her recent collaborative work with David MacMillan, identified a new cross-coupling paradigm which allows the combination of photoredox and nickel catalysis.

Source: Abigail Doyle. (Wikipedia) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abigail_Doyle; (Princeton) http://chemlabs.princeton.edu/doyle/people/about-abby/