FRENCH SCIENCE TODAY 2010 : HENRI B KAGAN
Professor Emeritus at the Institut de Chimie Moléculaire et des Matériaux d’Orsay and Member of the French Academy of Sciences
Dates and Venue
06/08: Department of Organic Chemistry, IISc Bangalore
12/08: National Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and Technology, Trivandrum
16/08: Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam
Henri Kagan, born in 1930, graduated from Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Chimie de Paris and Sorbonne in Paris. He obtained a Ph.D. in 1960 in Collège of France and became there a research associate with Prof. Horeau. After a stay in University of Texas in Austin, he moved as Assistant Professor to Paris-South University in Orsay in 1968 where he created the Laboratory of Asymmetric Synthesis. He retired in 1999 and he is presently emeritus Professor in the same University.
Dates and Venue
06/08: Department of Organic Chemistry, IISc Bangalore
12/08: National Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and Technology, Trivandrum
16/08: Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam
Henri Kagan, born in 1930, graduated from Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Chimie de Paris and Sorbonne in Paris. He obtained a Ph.D. in 1960 in Collège of France and became there a research associate with Prof. Horeau. After a stay in University of Texas in Austin, he moved as Assistant Professor to Paris-South University in Orsay in 1968 where he created the Laboratory of Asymmetric Synthesis. He retired in 1999 and he is presently emeritus Professor in the same University.
Prof. Kagan developed his research in various area of organic chemistry and stereochemistry. He was actively involved in the early stages of catalytic asymmetric hydrogenation. He described the first examples of chiral diphosphines (DIOP and analogs) as ligands of rhodium catalysts. He discovered the quite high enantioselective asymmetric oxidation of sulfides to sulfoxides by a modification of the Sharpless titanium complexes. He introduced the concept of nonlinear effects in asymmetric catalysis which in now very popular. He synthesized chiral ferrocenes with planar chirality by applying methods of asymmetric synthesis. Asymmetric photochemistry with circularly polarized light and introduction of samarium diiodide in organic synthesis are some other aspects of the research activity of Prof. Kagan.
He is credited of 350 publications and was the supervisor of 60 Ph.D. theses and 60 postdoctors. He was visiting Professor in various universities (in USA, Japan, India, etc). He was also invited lecturer in many international conferences. He is full member of the french Academy of Science since 1991. He is President of the Lavoisier Committee (Academy of Sciences) since 1992. He is foreign member of the Polish Academy of Science. He is Doctor Honoris Causa of University of Bucarest, of University of Basilicata, of University of Montréal. He is also guest Professor of two chinese universities. Prof. Kagan is Honorary member of Royal Society of Chemistry (UK) and of Indian Research Chemical Society. He received many honors and distinctions such as some prizes of Academy of Science and Société Chimique de France, the Prelog Medal (ETH Zurich), the August-Wilhelm-von-Hofmann Medal, the Nagoya Medal for Organic Chemistry, the Ryoji Noyori prize, the Bower award of the Franklin Institute, the Grand Prix de La Fondation de la Maison de la Chimie (shared with H. Yamamoto), the Descartes prize (with M. North and Y. Belokon), the Wolf prize in chemistry (shared with R. Noyori and K. B. Sharpless).
LECTURE TITLE: Lavoisier, the scientist, the citizen and the public figure
LECTURE TITLE: Lavoisier, the scientist, the citizen and the public figure
Antoine Laurent Lavoisier is well known as one of the fathers of the modern chemistry. He was key in the destruction of the phlogiston theory and in the introduction of new ideas to classify compounds and reactions. The nomenclature system that he and his colleagues invented is still in use to some extent. At this time he was mainly active in inorganic chemistry but he intended to explore the area of organic chemistry .Lavoisier entered at the age of 25 in Académie royale des sciences in the section of chemistry. Lavoisier became famous by his work on calcinations, combustion and on air composition. He introduced the name of oxygen. He also established that water was not an element but a combination of two elements, oxygen and hydrogen. With de Morveau, Berthollet and Fourcroy he proposed a new nomenclature which takes into account the combination of elements. This was a revolution at that time, and allowed to organize many experimental facts. He published in 1789 a fundamental and highly successful book, Traité Elementaire de Chimie, where he explained the new nomenclature and the chemical events without need of the phlogiston theory. He also described equipment and procedures useful in chemical operations. He was a supporter of quantitative chemical analysis, with accurate measurements of weights and volumes. His discussions on chemical reactions took into account the material balance and conservation of elements.
Lavoisier had a strong personality, he was very influential to support his ideas in chemistry. He made important contributions in biology. He established that respiration in animal is analogous to a slow combustion with consumption of oxygen and formation of carbone dioxide, water and heat.
Lavoisier was a rich man, because of a marriage with the young daughter of a tax collector Jacques Paulze. He became himself tax collector (“Fermier Général”). He could easily support a private laboratory with the most modern instruments of that time. Lavoisier became Director of the Department for manufacturing the gun powder (Régie des poudres et salpêtres). The quality of the French powder was disastrous and was one of the reasons of many defeats of the French troups. Lavoisier increased within a few years both production and quality of the powder which became the best in Europe. Lavoisier tried to improve agriculture, he also advised government about bank system or organization of cities. Finally he was a supporter of the metric system and worked in a state committee until a few months before his sentence of death by the Revolutionary Committee. It was not the scientist which was condemned but the unpopular tax collector. Lavoisier was guillotined in Paris at the age of 51, he left an immense scientific contribution. He was soon recognized as one of the most important scientists of all the times and as one of the fathers of the “Chemical Revolution”. In the lecture some points of the life and activity of Lavoisier will be developed.
For more information:
Pr Henri Kagan
Institut de Chimie Moléculaire et des Matériaux d’Orsay
UMR CNRS 8182, Laboratoire de Catalyse Moléculaire, Bât. 420
Université Paris-Sud, 91405 Orsay, France
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