Florida State University administrators have announced that Sir Harold W. Kroto, winner of the 1996 Nobel Prize for Chemistry, will be teaching at FSU during the spring term of 2004.
Kroto is a chemistry professor at Sussex University in Brighton, United Kingdom, where he studies nanoscience, the creation and study of intricately constructed complex molecules, and nanotechnology, the strategic application of new advances in the area of nanoscience.
Kroto is president of the Royal Society of Chemistry and is the co-founder of the Vega Science Trust. Established in 1994, the trust's mission is to create a broadcast platform for the science, engineering and technology (SET) communities, to enable them to better communicate the aspects of their fields of expertise using TV and the Internet.
"Professor Kroto's work stimulated an entire new branch of chemistry, one that likely will lead to amazing new applications, including new materials that will shape our world at both large and small scales," said Donald Foss, dean of the FSU College of Arts and Sciences. "He also has an interest in science education for young and old, and is himself a terrific speaker and teacher. We are delighted that he will be on our campus next spring."
Foss said that he hopes the relation between FSU and Kroto will develop into a continuing one.
Along with Robert F. Curl Jr. and Richard E. Smalley, Kroto won the 1996 Nobel Prize for Chemistry for the discovery of fullerenes, which are cagelike, hollow molecules made up of hexagonal and pentagonal groups of atoms that constitute a third form of carbon after diamond and graphite.
Although Kroto is best known for his co-discovery of buckminster-fullerenes, or "buckyballs" - molecules consisting of 60 carbon atoms in the shape of a soccer ball - he was already well known for his assignment of the spectra of several unusual molecules later identified in outer space, according to FSU chemistry Distinguished Research Professor Alan Marshall. Currently, Kroto is fabricating "buckytubes," consisting of a cylindrical carbon net that is stronger than steel and could form the basis for the thinnest possible electrical wires.
"Harry Kroto's discovery of buckyballs has opened up a whole new field of organic chemistry with potential technical and biomedical applications," said Naresh Dalal, chairman of the FSU department of chemistry and biochemistry. "Because of their nanometer-size and properties of forming the highest strength carbon rods, buckyballs are considered as the future building blocks for electronics components in nanoscale technology."
"Sir Harry's work in the field of fullerine chemistry has helped shape a new way of thinking about structures and especially devices," said FSU biological science Professor Tim Moerland, an associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. "This is one of the fundamental pieces in the new world of nanotechnology that, someday soon, will have a profound impact on us all."
"Sir Harry's keen intellect is matched by his energy and enthusiasm for advancing nanotechnology to become a useful reality in everyday living," said P. Bryant Chase, an associate professor of biological science at FSU. "The FSU bio-nanotechnology group is very excited about this opportunity to interact with him."
While at FSU, Kroto will work with faculty and students in the chemistry department and in related departments that have an interest in nanoscience. In addition, he will work with the Office of Distributed and Distance Learning on science outreach activities.
Kroto earned his doctorate in chemistry in 1964 from the University of Sheffield for research on high resolution electronic spectra of free radicals produced by flash photolysis. He started his academic career at the University of Sussex at Brighton in 1967, where he became a professor in 1985 and, in 1991, was made a Royal Society Research Professor.
In 2001, Kroto won the Royal Society's prestigious Michael Faraday Award. Widely acknowledged as one of the most prominent in United Kingdom science, the award is given annually to a scientist who, in the opinion of the Royal Society, has done the most to further public communication of science, engineering or technology in the United Kingdom.
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