Robert Curl
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Robert Floyd Jnr Curl
American chemist (1933–
Curl was educated at Rice University, Texas, and the University of California, Berkeley, where he gained his PhD in 1957. After working at Harvard he returned to Rice in 1967 as professor of chemistry.
Curl's initial work was on small clusters of atoms of semiconductors, such as germanium and silicon. In 1984, under the influence of Harry Kroto, he became interested in the possibility of producing long-chain carbon molecules, and persuaded his colleague Richard Smalley to deploy the resources of his laboratory towards this end. Although they expected on theoretical grounds to discover linear chain clusters with up to 33 carbon atoms, they in fact came across an unexpected molecule with 60 carbon atoms and with a cage-like structure. The discovery of this new allotrope of carbon, later named buckminsterfullerene, opened up a new branch of materials science.
Curl shared the 1996 Nobel Prize for chemistry with Smalley and Kroto.
Curl, Robert Floyd, Jr., 1933-, American chemist, b. Alice, Tex., Ph.D. Univ. of California, Berkeley, 1957. Curl has been a professor at Rice Univ. in Houston, Tex., since 1958. In 1996 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Richard Smalley and Harold Kroto for the discovery of fullerenes, which are carbon atoms bound in the form of a ball. Since the initial breakthrough by the three researchers, a number of structural variations on fullerenes have been developed, and much research has focused on exploring potential applications. These materials offer high heat resistance and superconductivity and have laid the foundation for work in the field of nanotechnology.
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Robert Curl
| Robert Curl | |
|---|---|
| Born | August 23, 1933 Alice, Texas, United States |
| Fields | Chemistry |
| Institutions | Rice University, Harvard University |
| Alma mater | Rice, University of California, Berkeley, PhD |
| Known for | fullerene |
| Notable awards | Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1996 |
Robert Floyd Curl, Jr. (born August 23, 1933) is an emeritus professor of chemistry at Rice University. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1996 for the discovery of fullerene (with the late Richard Smalley, also of Rice University, and Harold Kroto of the University of Sussex).
Born in Alice, Texas, United States, Curl was the son of a Methodist Minister.[1] He is a graduate of Thomas Jefferson High School in San Antonio, Texas. Curl received a B.A. from Rice Institute in 1954 and a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1957. Professor Curl's current research interests involve physical chemistry, developing DNA genotyping and sequencing instrumentation, and creating quantum cascade laser-based mid-infrared trace gas monitoring instrumentation. Curl often attended the German table at Hanszen College at Rice University. However, he is more known in the residential college life at Rice University for being the first master of Lovett College.
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Oxford Dictionary of Scientists
A Dictionary of Scientists. Copyright © Market House Books Ltd 1993, 1999, 2003. All rights reserved.
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Columbia Encyclopedia
The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2012, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/.
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Mentioned in
Sir Harold Walter Kroto
(British chemist)
Richard Errett Smalley
(American chemist)
Year 1996
(in Science & Technology)
Chemistry
(American history)
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