Michael J. S. Dewar

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Michael Dewar
Ahmednagar District, Bombay Presidency, British India
(now in Maharashtra, India)
Died10 October 1997(1997-10-10) (aged 79)
Gainesville, Florida, US
NationalityAmerican
Alma materUniversity of Oxford (BA, DPhil)
Known forDewar reactivity number
Dewar–Zimmerman analysis
Dewar–Chatt–Duncanson model
Semi-empirical quantum chemistry methods
Awards
Scientific career
Institutions
University of Texas 1963–
University of Florida 1989–1994
ThesisNew explosives (1942)
Doctoral advisorFrederick E. King[2]
Doctoral studentsNenad Trinajstić
Stipitatic acid

Michael James Steuart Dewar (24 September 1918 – 10 October 1997) was an American theoretical chemist.[3][4][5]

Education and early life

Dewar was the son of Scottish parents, Annie Balfour (Keith) and Francis Dewar.[6] He received the degrees of Bachelor of Arts, Master of Arts, and DPhil from Balliol College, Oxford.[7][8]

Career and research

Dewar was appointed to the Chair in Chemistry at

Queen Mary College of the University of London in 1951.[8] He moved to the University of Chicago in 1959 and then to the first Robert A. Welch research chair at the University of Texas at Austin in 1963.[8] After a long and productive period there, he moved to the University of Florida in 1989. He retired in 1994 as Professor Emeritus at the University of Florida.[3] He died in 1997.[8][9][10]

Dewar's reputation for providing original solutions to vexing puzzles first developed when he was still a postdoctoral fellow at the

alkenes, later known as the Dewar–Chatt–Duncanson model.[13][14]

In the early 1950s, Dewar wrote a famous series of six articles

antiaromatic transition states.[20] He did not however believe in the utility of Möbius aromaticity, introduced by Edgar Heilbronner
in 1964, and now a flourishing area of chemistry.

He is known most famously for the development in the 1970s and 1980s of the

density functional
procedures in less than two days, and semiempirical programs can be used to optimise the structures of molecules with perhaps 10,000 atoms.

He was a member of the International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science.[9]

Awards and honours

His accolades include: Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1966); Member of the National Academy of Sciences (1983); Honorary Fellow, Balliol College, Oxford (1974); Tilden Medal of the Chemical Society (1954); Harrison Howe Award of the American Chemical Society (1961);[citation needed] Robert Robinson Medal, Chemical Society (1974); G.W. Wheland Medal of the University of Chicago (1976); Evans Award, The Ohio State University (1977); Southwest Regional Award of the American Chemical Society (1978);[citation needed] Davy Medal (1982); James Flack Norris Award of the American Chemical Society (1984); William H. Nichols Award of the American Chemical Society (1986); Auburn-G. M. Kosolapoff Award of the American Chemical Society (1988);[citation needed] Tetrahedron Prize for Creativity in Organic Chemistry (1989);[citation needed] WATOC Medal (World Association of Theoretical Organic Chemists Medal), (1990).

Personal life

He is the father of Robert Dewar and C.E. Steuart Dewar.[22]

References

  1. S2CID 71610928
    .
  2. ^ "Michael J. S. Dewar, PhD Chemistry Tree". academictree.org.
  3. ^ a b Michael Dewar IAQMS page
  4. ^ Josef Michl and Marye Anne Fox (1998). "Michael J. S. Dewar September 24, 1918 – October 10, 1997" (PDF). Biographical Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences.
  5. ISBN 978-0-8412-2716-3
    .
  6. ^ Cook, Robert Cecil (1963). Who's Who in American Education. [ISBN missing]
  7. ^ Dewar, Michael James Steuart (1942). New explosives. ethos.bl.uk (PhD thesis). University of Oxford.
  8. ^ a b c d e f "Dewar page from the University of Texas". Archived from the original on 16 November 2005.
  9. ^ a b List of IAQMS members
  10. ISBN 978-0-8412-1771-3
    .
  11. S2CID 4086209
    .
  12. ^ M. J. S. Dewar (1951). "A review of π Complex Theory". Bull. Soc. Chim. Fr.: C71–79.
  13. ^
    doi:10.1021/ja01133a038
    .
  14. S2CID 4068424
    .
  15. doi:10.1021/ja01133a039
    .
  16. doi:10.1021/ja01133a040
    .
  17. doi:10.1021/ja01133a041
    .
  18. doi:10.1021/ja01133a042
    .
  19. doi:10.1021/ja01133a043
    .
  20. doi:10.1002/anie.197107611
    .
  21. ISSN 0009-2975
    .
  22. ^ DEWAR https://www.cesdewar.com/
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