Pioneering chemist and Caltech professor Robert Grubbs passes away at 79 years old
Nobel laureate and Caltech professor Robert Grubbs passed away on Sunday — a legendary chemist who was an “equally remarkable husband, father, grandfather, friend, and colleague,” according to Dennis Dougherty, a fellow Caltech professor.
He was 79.
Grubbs is perhaps best known for developing the metathesis method in organic synthesis — a feat that earned him and two other chemists (Richard Schrock and Yves Chauvin) a Nobel Prize in 2005. Metathesis, which means “change places,” is a type of chemical reaction in which double bonds between carbon atoms are broken and reorganized at the same time as atomic groups change place. Around 1992, Grubbs discovered a metallic compound that effectively facilitates metathesis, and is stable in the air.
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