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Jerry Atwood
Journal of Supramolecular Chemistry 1 (2001) xiii
Preface
Jerry Atwood Jerry Atwood was born in rural Missouri and raised on a farm. He attended Southwest Missouri State University where he played basketball and studied chemistry and mathematics. He moved to the University of Illinois for graduate studies and worked there with Galen Stucky. He went directly, without any post-doctoral study, to the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. During his time there, he became University Professor of Science. After 25 years at the University of Alabama, Jerry returned ‘home’ to Missouri where he is currently Curators’ Professor and Chair of the Department of Chemistry at the University of Missouri in Columbia. Jerry Atwood is in the midst of a long career that exhibits both remarkable versatility and continuing originality. The focus of much of his early work was on organometallic compounds such as alkylaluminum species. He explored the questions of unusual bonding in these systems by using solid state structure determination. Some individuals trained in the same era assumed a service role in their use of X-ray crystallography. In marked contrast, Jerry used structure determination as a tool in the way that has become commonplace some two decades later. In this early work, he considerably extended the general understanding of how versatile are these Lewis acids. As early as 1981, Jerry began to use crown ethers to probe the Lewis acid chemistry of aluminum and related organometallic species. His extensive studies of interactions between aluminum, zirconium, etc. and crown ethers pioneered the area of organometallic complexation. In all cases, detailed structural analysis of the interactions was revealed by careful solid state structure work. These efforts led to studies of other Lewis acidic species that are stabilized by complexation with crown ethers. Jerry reported structures of the hydronium cation, the H2O– BF3 complex, H5 Oþ 2 , and even Br3 , all of which were obtained as a result of crown stabilization. Again, Jerry effectively pioneered this area of study. In recent years, I think Jerry has been most enthusiastically recognized by the scientific community for his efforts in calixarene chemistry. As in his crown ether work, he sought to identify and understand the difficult or improbable complexation cases. He identified aromatic contacts and hydrogen bonds between such solvents as chlorocarbons and the aromatic interior of the
calix. He has used the calix to form external sandwich complexes with a variety of metals and sought to prepare imaginative inclusion systems such as that he reported in several very prestigious Nature and Science articles. Most recently, he has developed a general system for understanding supramolecular assemblies in terms of Platonic and Archimedean solids. There is always debate about how to assess stature. For some, a faculty appointment at a top 5 university is evidence enough. Two more quantitative measures are research output and citations. Jerry has authored or coauthored over 600 papers, patents, reviews, chapters, and books. Nearly 100 of these are papers that appear in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Jerry has also published seven papers in Science and Nature. Has the scientific community been impressed by this output? A recent citation survey conducted for the Institute for Scientific Information listed the citations of 627,871 chemical authors whose work appeared between 1981 and 1996. On that list, Jerry’s citations ranked 33. Among individuals clearly identified with his field, only Nobel Laureate Jean-Marie Lehn ranked higher (10). Jerry’s contributions have been especially important to the field of supramolecular chemistry. He founded the Journal of Inclusion Phenomena, Supramolecular Chemistry, and this Journal. He organized a board of editors that ultimately produced Comprehensive Supramolecular Chemistry (Pergamon-Elsevier, 1996). Jerry was also a founding member of the Inclusion Phenomena meeting that has evolved into the International Symposium on Supramolecular Chemistry (ISSC), held in 2002 in Israel and scheduled again for 2004 at the University of Notre Dame. All of these data and statistics fail to capture the essence of Jerry Atwood as a man. I have been privileged to be his friend for many years. I can say, without hesitation, that he is as kind, supportive, and generous as he is distinguished. I know the community and especially the authors of the papers in this volume of the Journal of Supramolecular Chemistry wish Jerry many more birthdays accompanied by exciting research results.
1472-7862/03/$ - see front matter # 2003 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. doi:10.1016/S1472-7862(03)00009-1
George Gokel
Preface
Jerry Atwood Jerry Atwood was born in rural Missouri and raised on a farm. He attended Southwest Missouri State University where he played basketball and studied chemistry and mathematics. He moved to the University of Illinois for graduate studies and worked there with Galen Stucky. He went directly, without any post-doctoral study, to the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. During his time there, he became University Professor of Science. After 25 years at the University of Alabama, Jerry returned ‘home’ to Missouri where he is currently Curators’ Professor and Chair of the Department of Chemistry at the University of Missouri in Columbia. Jerry Atwood is in the midst of a long career that exhibits both remarkable versatility and continuing originality. The focus of much of his early work was on organometallic compounds such as alkylaluminum species. He explored the questions of unusual bonding in these systems by using solid state structure determination. Some individuals trained in the same era assumed a service role in their use of X-ray crystallography. In marked contrast, Jerry used structure determination as a tool in the way that has become commonplace some two decades later. In this early work, he considerably extended the general understanding of how versatile are these Lewis acids. As early as 1981, Jerry began to use crown ethers to probe the Lewis acid chemistry of aluminum and related organometallic species. His extensive studies of interactions between aluminum, zirconium, etc. and crown ethers pioneered the area of organometallic complexation. In all cases, detailed structural analysis of the interactions was revealed by careful solid state structure work. These efforts led to studies of other Lewis acidic species that are stabilized by complexation with crown ethers. Jerry reported structures of the hydronium cation, the H2O– BF3 complex, H5 Oþ 2 , and even Br3 , all of which were obtained as a result of crown stabilization. Again, Jerry effectively pioneered this area of study. In recent years, I think Jerry has been most enthusiastically recognized by the scientific community for his efforts in calixarene chemistry. As in his crown ether work, he sought to identify and understand the difficult or improbable complexation cases. He identified aromatic contacts and hydrogen bonds between such solvents as chlorocarbons and the aromatic interior of the
calix. He has used the calix to form external sandwich complexes with a variety of metals and sought to prepare imaginative inclusion systems such as that he reported in several very prestigious Nature and Science articles. Most recently, he has developed a general system for understanding supramolecular assemblies in terms of Platonic and Archimedean solids. There is always debate about how to assess stature. For some, a faculty appointment at a top 5 university is evidence enough. Two more quantitative measures are research output and citations. Jerry has authored or coauthored over 600 papers, patents, reviews, chapters, and books. Nearly 100 of these are papers that appear in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Jerry has also published seven papers in Science and Nature. Has the scientific community been impressed by this output? A recent citation survey conducted for the Institute for Scientific Information listed the citations of 627,871 chemical authors whose work appeared between 1981 and 1996. On that list, Jerry’s citations ranked 33. Among individuals clearly identified with his field, only Nobel Laureate Jean-Marie Lehn ranked higher (10). Jerry’s contributions have been especially important to the field of supramolecular chemistry. He founded the Journal of Inclusion Phenomena, Supramolecular Chemistry, and this Journal. He organized a board of editors that ultimately produced Comprehensive Supramolecular Chemistry (Pergamon-Elsevier, 1996). Jerry was also a founding member of the Inclusion Phenomena meeting that has evolved into the International Symposium on Supramolecular Chemistry (ISSC), held in 2002 in Israel and scheduled again for 2004 at the University of Notre Dame. All of these data and statistics fail to capture the essence of Jerry Atwood as a man. I have been privileged to be his friend for many years. I can say, without hesitation, that he is as kind, supportive, and generous as he is distinguished. I know the community and especially the authors of the papers in this volume of the Journal of Supramolecular Chemistry wish Jerry many more birthdays accompanied by exciting research results.
1472-7862/03/$ - see front matter # 2003 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. doi:10.1016/S1472-7862(03)00009-1
George Gokel