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June 2017

Archives for June 2017

Professor Xue Named 2017 ACS Fellow

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Professor Ben Xue (right) with Professor Donna J. Nelson, ACS Immediate Past President

Professor Ben Xue (right) with Professor Donna J. Nelson, ACS Immediate Past President

Ziling (Ben) Xue, Professor of Chemistry, has been named one of the 65 American Chemical Society Fellows in 2017, announced in the June 19 issue of Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN) and was honored at the fall ACS National Meeting in Washington, DC. ACS Fellows Program recognizes members for their “outstanding achievements in and contributions to science, the profession, and the Society.”

Xue was honored for his “significant contributions to synthetic and physical inorganic chemistry. He discovered the pathway to the archetypical carbene that led a Nobel Prize and is cited in textbooks in the field, ” stated on the ACS website.

Also mentioned was Xue’s contribution to the ACS community. “As the Division of Inorganic Chemistry Membership Chair for eight years, Xue led successful recruitment activities, resulting in 300%, 20%, and 31% increases in undergraduate, student, and total new memberships, respectively, in 2015.”

Xue came to UT in 1992 after receiving his bachelor’s degree from Nanjing University-Nanjing University College of Pharmacy, completing his doctorate from the University of California, Los Angeles, and doing postdoctoral research at Indiana University. He was previously named an National Science Foundation (NSF) Young Investigator. Xue is also a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He has served as UT’s College of Arts and Sciences representative on university-wide committees. Xue has also been an associate editor of Science China Chemistry, a flagship publication of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Picture credit: American Chemical Society

Professor Kovac Selected Panelist of 67 Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting

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Jeff KovacJeff Kovac, professor of chemistry at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville was invited to be a panelist, leading a discussion of “Ethics in Science,” at the closing panel of 67th Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting. The meeting will be held from June 25th to 30th, the panel discussion will take place on June 30th on Mainau Island, Germany.

“In preparation of this panel discussion, our scientific chairpersons Professor Astrid Gräslund and Professor Wolfgang Lubitz suggested Professor Kovac as a panelist, based on his large experience in the field and his publications and presentations.” said Wolfgang Huang, Director Executive Secretariat of Council for the Lindau Nobel Laureate Meetings.

Kovac joined the chemistry department at UT. He has a bachelor’s degree from Reed College, a doctorate from Yale University, and two years of postdoctoral research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

In recent years, Kovac has frequently spoke about ethics in chemistry. He gave a talk titled “Ethics of chemical weapon research” during 2016 American Chemical Society’s meeting in Denver, CO in March. His talk was highlighted on C&EN website as part of “Denver National Meeting Mania.” Then in fall 2016, Kovac was invited by the Swiss Academy of Sciences (SCNAT) to speak in SCNAT Ethics Lecture Tour, where he visited six universities and academic institutions in Switzerland at the end of October and beginning of November.

The Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting started in 1951. Each year, “the most promising young students come to the small island of Lindau to meet with Nobel Laureates for a week full of inspiration,” said Huang. For this year’s meeting, 420 young scientists from 78 countries have been selected to participate after passing a multi-stage international selection process.