Imperial Chemistry

August Wilhelm Hofmann

Origins

The Chemistry Department at Imperial spans three centuries, from the nineteenth to the twenty-first. The ancestor both of our present Department and of Imperial College itself was the Royal College of Chemistry (RCC).

Nobel prize winner Sir Geoffrey Wilkinson

Nobel Prizes

Many famous chemists were and are at the Department. Two Nobel prizes for chemistry were awarded to our staff, both of whom had done their BSc and PhD degrees here. Sir Derek Barton (1918–1998)received one for organic conformational analysis in 1969 and Sir Geoffrey Wilkinson (1921–1996)in 1973 for organometallic chemistry.

Margaret Goodgame

Women in Chemistry

Through the years women have made significant contributions to the Chemistry Department ranging from two of the most celebrated early members Frances Micklethwaite & Martha Whiteley to more recently Professor Sue Gibson awarded an OBE in 2013 for 'services to chemistry and science education’