Charles J. Pedersen
Winner of the 1987 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Summary of Charles J. Pedersen
A dedicated chemist with the soul of an artist, Charles Pedersen enjoyed life - gardening, fishing, poker games with his friends, birdwatching, writing poetry. Pedersen was born in Korea in 1904. His father was a Norwegian mining engineer, his mother Japanese. After attending preparatory school in Japan he set out alone for the United States to attend college, never to see his parents again.
He studied chemical engineering at the University of Dayton and received a master's degree from M.I.T. His professors wanted him to continue on for his doctorate, but Pedersen, tired of sending bills home to his father, elected to join DuPont. He reported to Jackson Laboratory in Deepwater, New Jersey in 1927.
Early in his career, Pedersen discovered improvements in the process for making tetraethyl lead, the gasoline additive. Among his 65 U.S. patents were the first deactivators to counter the degradative effects of heavy metals in gasolines, oils and rubbers.
In 1957, Pedersen moved to the Experimental Station. Encouraged to concentrate on the catalytic action of trace heavy metals and their control by use of organic ligands, he decided on a systematic study of complexes of vanadyl ion. In one of the reactions, he was left with a "brownish goo" and discovered some unknown crystals in it. Intrigued by their properties, he continued to investigate and discovered macrocyclic polyethers, or crown ethers. Exhilarating research followed. An extensive article published in 1967, two years before he retired, described the synthesis of the compounds and became a classic for other researchers to build upon. For this work, which capped his career, Pedersen, in 1987, became the first career DuPont scientist to win a Nobel Prize.
Fascination for everything around him, unspoiled curiosity and the knack for asking the right questions opened up a world that Charles Pedersen enthusiastically explored.