Professors Peter Guthrie, Ron Martin and Peter Norton announce their retirement, effective July 1, 2010.
Professor Peter Guthrie is a Western Alumnus having been awarded a Bachelor of Science in 1964 from this university. He went on to complete his PhD under the supervision of F. Westheimer at Harvard University in 1968. After a year as a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Biological Sciences at Princeton University, he joined the Department of Chemistry at UWO in 1969. He rose through the ranks and was promoted to Professor in 1978. Peter Guthrie works in the area of fundamental physical organic chemistry. The common theme throughout his research has been his search for a deeper understanding of the factors governing the rates of chemical reactions so that, ultimately, these rates may be predicted from the structures of the reactants. Increasingly, his work has involved the calculation of rate constants using, at first, Marcus Theory, and now No Barrier Theory (NBT), an approach which allows rate constants to be calculated from equilibrium information with no empirical parameters. In the early part of his career, Peter’s work was recognized by a prestigious Sloan Fellowship as well as an E.W.R. Steacie Memorial Fellowship. He won the Florence Bucke Award of the Faculty of Science in 1984. In 2002, Peter was named Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. Peter has been awarded every research prize for which he is eligible from the Canadian Society of Chemistry and the Chemical Institute of Canada, including the CIC Medal (2005), the highest research honor that a chemist can be awarded in Canada.
Professor Ron Martin received his Honours B. Sc. degree in 1963 and his M.Sc. degree in 1965 from St. Francis Xavier University, and his Ph.D. degree at Western in 1969. After completing two post doctoral fellowships, one at the University of Southampton, 1969-1970, and one in the Western Physics Department from 1970-1971, he joined the Chemistry Department at Western as a Visiting Lecturer in 1972 with expertise in Chemical Education. His status changed to an Assistant Professor rank in 1974, and he was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in 1978 and Professor of Chemistry in 2006. Ron is a physical chemist with established expertise in interdisciplinary research using a variety of analytical methods including synchrotron radiation to examine different physical systems, including coals, metals in the environment, and mummy teeth and hair. Ron is a gifted teacher; he has used that gift effectively in a wide variety of undergraduate courses including first year chemistry, environmental chemistry and analytical chemistry. Ron's outstanding abilities as a teacher have been recognized at UWO (Pleva Award), provincially (OCUFA Teaching Award) and nationally (Chemical Institute of Canada Union Carbide Medal).
Professor Peter Norton is one of Canada’s most distinguished physical chemists. Throughout his career Peter has proven to be at the leading edge of science and technology across a number of disciplines related to the chemistry and physics of surfaces. He was one of the first to perform ultra-high vacuum adiabatic calorimetry; the first to identify spectroscopically the bonding of carbon monoxide to platinum surfaces; he initiated the work on catalytic oscillations in CO oxidation in Prof. Gerhard Ertl's group in 1980, which was eventually cited as one of the 2 major areas for which Prof. Ertl was awarded the 2007 Nobel Prize in Chemistry; he was a leader in the application of high energy ion beams to study surfaces, and in the standardization of Rutherford backscattering and nuclear reaction analysis for quantitative isotopes on noble metal surfaces. He was among the first to recognize and embrace the power of scanning probe technology for studying interfacial dynamic phenomena. He has implemented a variety of scanning microscopies to the study of problems ranging from the association of molecules on copper surfaces, the heterogeneity of polymer surfaces, the adhesion of bacteria to polymeric surfaces and the mechanical properties materials as diverse as cells, and the films responsible for the wear protection in an automobile engine (nanotribology of antiwear films). Peter has been recognized with numerous awards including a Humboldt Fellowship, Fellow of the Chemical Institute of Canada, the Parravano Award of the Michigan Catalysis Society, Fellow of the American Vacuum Society, the Polanyi Lecture Award of the Canadian Society for Chemistry, a Canada Council Killam Research Fellowship, and the Hellmuth Prize. Most recently, he was named Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.
All three will continue to be engaged in research after retirement. We wish them well as they start this new phase of their lives!
March 2010:
Recently, Dr. Amit Chakma, University President and Vice-Chancellor, visited the Department of Chemistry as part of a meet and greet session, and as an opportunity to share some of his research visions for the university. Shown is President Chakma interacting with students in the first year chemistry laboratory.
March 2010:
Professor Rob Lipson has accepted the position of Dean, Faculty of Science at the University of Victoria effective July 1, 2010. Rob has been an integral member of this department since 1986. He has made many valuable contributions to the research and teaching missions of this department, most notably as the former Chair of the Department. During his tenure as Chair, the department experienced a period of growth and renewal unprecedented since the 1960s. He was intimately involved in recruiting and hiring 13 new faculty members and several staff members, revamping our undergraduate curriculum, procuring more research space, and getting funds to build better undergraduate teaching facilities and a Solvent Dispensing Facility. We wish you well, Rob!
March 2010: Professor Leo Lau, director of Surface Science Western, receives a $1.7 million grant from the Ontario Research Foundation to study elastic polymers. See the article on pages 1 and 14 in Western News.
February 2010: Several members of the Department of Chemistry will be featured in segments of Ancients Behaving Badly which will be shown on History Television during the weeks of February 15 and February 22. Robin Abel, recent MSc graduate, was involved in the extraction of three plant poisons, hemlock, strychnine and cyanide, which were suspected to have been used in the poisoning of Nero’s stepbrother Britannicus. Christina Booker, PhD candidate, was involved in the preparation of poisons from henbane, monkshood and rhododendron one of which may have been used in the poisoning of Ptolemy by his sister Cleopatra. Mel Usselman, Professor, discussed the legend of Cleopatra serving Marc Antony an expensive meal consisting of her prized pearls dissolved in wine. Tim Erickson, University of Illinois Department of Emergency Medicine, Division of Toxicology, was also featured. He discussed which of the poisons could have actually been used.Other members of the department helped out too to make production go more smoothly, and these included Kim Baines, Sandy Zakaria, Rob Harbottle, Sue England, and Robin Hall. An abbreviated article from the Western News may be found here on page 11.
Nero will air on Tuesday, February 16 at 2 p.m., 6 p.m. and 10 p.m., on Friday, February 19 at 7 p.m. and on Saturday, February 20 at midnight and 10 p.m.
Cleopatra will air on Tuesday, February 23 at 2 p.m., 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. and on Saturday, February 27 at 6 p.m.
After it airs, you can watch the show on line here.
December 2009: We are pleased to announce the promotions of Nathan Jones and Paul Ragogna to Associate Professor, effective July 1st. Congratulations on your many successes! Additionally, Nathan Jones is on a permanent leave of absence, and will formally leave Western at the end June. Nathan is moving to British Columbia to be with his family. We wish you all the best. A congratulatory celebration for both Nathan and Paul, and a farewell reception for Nathan was held for them at the Grad Club.
November 2009: We are glad to announce that Jay Dutton (supervised by Paul Ragogna) and Julie Hardwick (supervised by Kim Baines) won prizes for their talks and Jon Dube (Supervised by Paul Ragogna) and Margaret Hanson (supervised by Kim Baines and Yining Huang) won prizes for their posters at the Inorganic Discussion Weekend held November 2009, in Guelph. Congratulations on your success!
August 2009: We are pleased to announce that Professor Len Luyt has been awarded an Early Researcher Award from the Ministry of Research and Innovation in support of his research on the design of cancer-targeted molecular imaging probes. Congratulations Len!
June 2009: The Departments of Chemistry and Physics & Astronomy celebrated the Grand Opening of the Materials Science Addition, which houses Canada's newest first-year chemistry and physics teaching laboratories, and state-of-the-art research facilities. Left: Prof. Kim Baines. Right: President Paul Davenport.
June 2009:
Several Western students received accolades for presentations and posters at the 92nd 2009 CSC conference held in Hamilton, Ontario. Barb Bajtos (Pagenkopf) won an award for a top oral presentation in the Organic Chemistry Division with "The Application of [3 +2] Dipolar Annulation and Alkylation Reactions Involving Donor-acceptor 2-Alkoxycyclopropanoate Esters in Total Synthesis". Dave Dodd (Hudson) received the "Nucleic Acids Presentation Award (oral)" from the organizers of the Nucleic Acids Symposium. Four poster presentations also won awards: Kevin Daub (Wren) won the best poster award in the Surface Science Division with"An Electrochemical and Surface Analytical study of Carbon Steel Corrosion in the presence of Either Radiolytically-Produced or Chemically-Added Oxidants." Betty Galarreta (Lagugné-Labarthet and Norton) won the best poster prize in the Materials Chemistry division with "Physical and Optical Characterization of Metallic Nanopatterns". Ian Rupar was also involved in this project. Mohamed Moustafa (Hudson) won a poster prize with "Nucleobase Azo Compounds as Analogs of DABCYL: New Florescence Quenchers". Pam Yakabuskie (Wren) has won the best poster prize in the Analytical Chemistry Division with "Radiation-Induced Reactions of Nitrogen-Containing Species". Congratulations Everyone!
June 2009: Professor Brian Pagenkopf receives a National Science and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) Discovery Accelerator Supplement to support his research on new synthetic methods, natural products synthesis and silole based materials. Congratulations Brian!
June 2009: The winners of this year's ASPIRE award, which allows graduate students to perform research abroad, are Josh Byers and Caleb Martin. Josh will be traveling to The University of Pierre and Marie Curie (Paris-VI) and Caleb is going to The University of California at Riverside. Congratulations, Josh and Caleb!
June 2009: Andrew Leduc was selected to receive the Professor Jack W. Lorimer Convocation Honour. He will wear academic regalia donated by Professor Emertius Lorimer's first PhD student, Dr. Tom Brydges in honour of Professor Lorimer, at convocation. Jack is a world class researcher in various areas of physical chemistry, for example, in the thermodynamics of liquids, transport phenomena in membranes, irreversible thermodynamics, and electrochemistry and has published over sixty publications in these fields. He has remained actively involved in research since retirement including continuing his long time commitment and contributions to the IUPAC. As a teacher at Western, Jack taught extensively at the first year level and has taught, at one time or another, all of Western’s physical chemistry and statistical mechanics undergraduate courses as well as graduate courses in his field of research specialization. He developed, or helped to develop, the precursor courses to many of those offered by our department today. We would like to thank thank Dr. Brydges (left) for recognizing Jack (right) in this way and for his contribution to the department, and say our congratulations to Andrew (centre)!
May 2009: We would like to congratulate graduate student Pellumb Jakupi (supervised by David Shoesmith) on winning the Canadian Nuclear Society 2009 R. Jervis graduate student award!
May 2009: We are pleased to announce that Professor Paul Ragogna has been named The University of Western Ontario's Petro-Canada Young Innovator for 2009-2010. These awards were established to recognize, promote and support outstanding new faculty researchers whose work is particularly innovative, impacts positively on the learning environment in the department in which they study, and has the potential to be of significance to society at large. The program is intended to help attract and retain bright young minds at Canadian Universities and institutes and to help young researchers launch their scholarly careers and enable them to carry their research forward. Congratulations, Paul!
May 2009: We are pleased to annouce that graduate students Duncan Sutherland, Laura Pavelka, and Caleb Martin have received the 2004 CSC Conference travel awards in 2009. The CSC conference was held in London, Ontario, in 2004, and the proceeds of the conference were used to establish these rewards.
April 2009: We are delighted to announce that Joshua Byers is a recipient of a Faculty of Science Graduate Student Teaching Award. Teaching assistants contribute immensely to not only the undergraduate teaching missions of the Department of Chemistry and the Faculty of Science, but also to Western's standing as Canada's Best Student Experience. As a tutorial, help room, and residence/library TA for Chemistry 020, 023, and 1050, Joshua's patience and willingness to help students learn course material did not go unnoticed. To this end, the Award recognizes Joshua’s exceptional contributions to these courses and to the undergraduate experience at Western.
April 2009: We are pleased to announce that Avedis Karadeolian was awarded this year's Robert and Ruth Lumsden Graduate Award and that and Christine Caputo is the recipient of the Robert and Ruth Lumsden Graduate Fellowship. Congratulations, Avedis and Christine!
March 2009: Professor Rob Lipson has been named a Fellow of the Chemical Institute of Canada! CIC Fellowships are granted to individuals for exceptional contributions to the chemical profession, including scientific and technical contributions, contributions to teaching, and/or contributions to scientific management including contributions to the Chemical Institute of Canada and the Canadian Society for Chemistry (CSC). As winner of the Florence Bucke Award and a Distinguished Research Professorship from the Faculty of Science, a Pleva Teaching Award winner, former Chair of the Department of Chemistry at Western, past Chair of the 2004 CSC Conference and current member of the Board of Directors of the CSC, Rob is certainly deserving of this honor.
February 2009: The Department of Chemistry is pleased that Prof. Lars Konermann has been appointed Canada Research Chair in Biophysical Protein Mass Spectrometry. Lars is one of Western's four newsest Canada Research Chairs.More details here.
February 2009: We are pleased to announce that the Senate Subcommittee on Teaching Awards has selected Professor Felix Lee as the recipient of The Marilyn Robinson Award for Excellence in Teaching! Congratulations Felix, on this recognition of your many efforts and successes in teaching our students! The award is awarded
based on evidence of outstanding contributions in the area of classroom, laboratory, or
clinical instruction, and is intended for faculty with less than seven years' experience.
February 2009: Dr. Barry Blight, a recent graduate from the
Wisner group, has been selected as the recipient for this year's Paul de Mayo Award for Excellence in Chemical Research! Congratulations. This is the most prestigious graduate student alumni award Western Chemistry has to offer. The award consists of a medal, a plaque and funds to cover travel costs to return to Western and present a seminar. We look forward to seeing you again soon!
February 2009: We are delighted to announce that Katayoun Yazdanfar in the Clara Wren and David Shoesmith groups has been selected as the recipient for this year's Dr. Joseph Soltys Graduate Award in Chemistry. Congratulations Katayoun! This award was established by Mrs. Judith Soltys and others, in memory of Dr. Joe Soltys (BSc '63, PhD '69), through Foundation Western.
January 2009: We are extremely pleased to announce that Professor Bernie Kraatz has been awarded the 2009 Florence Bucke Science Prize. The Bucke Prize is awarded to a junior faculty member for outstanding contributions to research. His award address will be given at 7:30 pm on March 31, 2009. Mark your calendars; more details to follow!
December 2008: Cheryl O'Meara retired after 27 years of service to Chemistry (~36 years to Western). Cheryl will be fondly remembered for her many contributions particularly as the Graduate Coordinator but also as a former secretary to the Photochemistry Unit and several faculty. She also was instrumental in planning many social events, including the Hallowe'en potluck, the golf tournament, and the chili luncheon. I am sure Danny will enjoy her company for the rest of the days of his life. If you would like to send Cheryl a message, her e-mail (comeara@uwo.ca) is still active. We wish her all the best and much happiness in her retirement!
December 2008: Dr. Ted Hewitt, VP (Research and International Relations) held a reception is honour of the latest CFI and CRC awardees. Professors Paul Ragogna and Leo Lau were honoured for their success in the recent CFI New Opportunities Fund competition and Professor Francois Lagugné-Labarthetwas recognized as the recipient of a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in Nanomaterials and Photonics. Congratulations to all!
December 2008: We would like to welcome Ms. Aneta Borecki back to the Department of Chemistry. Aneta will be working in Chemistry Stores as a Stores Assistant and for Prof. Beth Gillies as a Technical Assistant. Aneta graduated from the Department of Chemistry with a BSc in 2004 and a MSc in 2006, she worked at KGK Synergize Inc. as an analytical chemist.
December 2008: At the 41st Inorganic Discussion Weekend held at Brock University,graduate student Julie Hardwick (Baines group) was awarded the first place Dalton Poster Prize. In the same competition, graduate student Christine Caputo (Jones group) was awarded second place. Congratulations Julie and Christine!
November 2008: We are delighted to announce that the following professors in the Department of Chemistry have been named to the University Students' Council 2007-2008 Teaching Honour Roll for their outstanding performance in teaching: Beth Gillies, Robert Hudson, Lars Konermann, Francois Lagugné-Labarthet, Felix Lee, Dick Puddephatt, Martin Stillman, Mel Usselman, and Mark Workentin.
November 2008: We very pleased to announce that Professor Bernie Kraatz has been granted tenure and promoted to Professor effective July 1, 2009. Congratulations, Bernie!
November 2008: At the Quebec-Ontario Mini-Symposia in Synthetic and Bioorganic Chemistry (QOMSBOC), hosted by the University of Toronto, graduate student Andrew Leduc (Kerr group) won one of four awards for best poster. Congratulations, Andrew!
November 2008: We would like to congratulate our graduate students, Catherine Nowierski (first-place poster winner, joint graduate student in the Shoesmith and Ding groups) and Ajit Mishra (student travel grant, graduate student in the Shoesmith group), for their award-winning efforts at the Canadian Section Electrochemical Society Conference.
September 2008: We pleased to announce that Dr. Mathew Willans will join our department as the NMR Facility Manager. Mat just completed his PhD in solid state spectroscopy at the University of Alberta under the supervision of Prof. Rod Wasylishen. Welcome to Western, Mat!
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