My birth in July 1928 in Methuen, Massachusetts was followed just eighteen months later by the death of my father, Elias, a successful business man in that community 30 miles north of Boston. My mother, Fatina (née Hasham), changed my name from William to Elias shortly after my father’s passing. I do not remember my…

Richard Martin Willstätter was born in Karlsruhe in Baden on August 13, 1872, and went to school first in his home town and then, when his parents moved house, at the Technical School in Nuremberg. When he was 18 he went to the University of Munich where he studied Science, entered the Department of Chemistry…

Harold Clayton Urey was born in Walkerton, Indiana, on April 29, 1893, as the son of the Rev. Samuel Clayton Urey and Cora Rebecca Reinoehl, and grandson of pioneers who settled in Indiana. His early education in rural schools led to his graduation from high school in 1911 after which he taught for three years…

Presentation Speech by former Councillor T. Nordström, President of , on December 10, 1913 Your Majesty, Your Royal Highnesses, Ladies and Gentlemen. The Royal Academy of Sciences has awarded this year’s Nobel Prize for Chemistry to Alfred Werner, Professor in the University of Zürich, “for his work on the linkage of atoms in molecules, by…

Presentation Speech by Professor W. Palmær, Chairman of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry of , on December 10, 1934 Your Majesty, Your Royal Highnesses, Ladies and Gentlemen. A short time ago a politician of prominent rank, when speaking on a festal occasion, remarked that at the present day it might appear to be an actual…

The 1938 Nobel Prize in Chemistry rewarded a prime example of how the bonds between different scientific disciplines can form in the most unexpected places. In this instance, a chemist’s curiosity for unusual interactions between molecules provided a crucial biological connection to understanding essential food nutrients important for health and disease. Richard Kuhn was fascinated…

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Contents: Based on materials from the 1999 Nobel Poster for Chemistry.

Retrosynthetic analysis can be compared to the climbing of a tree. You are at the root of the tree (the target molecule) and want to climb to the top branches (the starting materials). The tree branches off many times. You have to choose your way! Which way is the fastest, the easiest and the most…