Richard John Puddephatt, One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where: was born 1943 in Aylesbury, England. He is a distinguished university professor in the department of chemistry at the

University of Western Ontario The University of Western Ontario (UWO), also known as Western University or Western, is a public research university in London, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is located on of land, surrounded by residential neighbourhoods and the Thames R ...

, in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, Ontario, Canada. Richard is a former holder of a Canada research chair in material synthesis. He has been studying the fundamental chemistry of gold and other precious metals in the development of new materials for potential applications in health care and electronics. Puddephatt's research interests involve organometallic chemistry related to catalysis and materials science,University of Western Ontario Profile
/ref> and he is considered a world expert on platinum and gold chemistry.
/ref> He has authored two books: ''The Chemistry of Gold'' and ''The Periodic Table of Elements''.Bibliography at Amazon.com
/ref>
/ref>

Education

* Penn and Tylers Green Primary School * High Wycombe Royal Grammar School * BSc from the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...

in 1965 * PhD from

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

in 1968

Research and career

Puddephatt has conducted pioneering research on synthesis, reactivity and elucidation of mechanisms in the organometallic chemistry of the

noble metal A noble metal is ordinarily regarded as a metallic chemical element that is generally resistant to corrosion and is usually found in nature in its raw form. Gold, platinum, and the other platinum group metals ( ruthenium, rhodium, palladium, o ...

s, particularly related to the role of organometallic compounds in catalysis and in materials science. He has elucidated the mechanisms of reactions which are fundamental in many homogenous catalytic processes, most notably in studies of

oxidative Redox (reduction–oxidation, , ) is a type of chemical reaction in which the oxidation states of substrate change. Oxidation is the loss of electrons or an increase in the oxidation state, while reduction is the gain of electrons or a d ...

addition and reductive elimination with alkylplatinum and alkyl–gold complexes and of skeletal rearrangements of metallacyclobutane complexes, often called the Puddephatt rearrangement. Remarkable coordinatively unsaturated platinum clusters and platinum–rhenium clusters have been synthesised and shown to be excellent mimics of the surface reactivity, related to heterogeneous catalysis by supported platinum and bimetallic platinum–rhenium catalysts. New, commercially useful organometallic precursors for chemical vapour deposition (CVD) of thin films of metals such as palladium, platinum, silver and gold have been discovered and the fundamental mechanisms of those CVD processes elucidated. He has also synthesised

catenane In macromolecular chemistry, a catenane () is a mechanically interlocked molecular architecture consisting of two or more interlocked macrocycles, i.e. a molecule containing two or more intertwined rings. The interlocked rings cannot be se ...

s and metal-containing polymers by dynamic ring opening

polymerisation In polymer chemistry, polymerization (American English), or polymerisation (British English), is a process of reacting monomer molecules together in a chemical reaction to form polymer chains or three-dimensional networks. There are many for ...

Awards and honours

Puddephatt was won numerous awards including * Officer of the

Order of Canada The Order of Canada (french: Ordre du Canada; abbreviated as OC) is a Canadian state order and the second-highest honour for merit in the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, after the Order of Merit. To coincide with the cen ...

Order of Canada Profile
/ref> * Distinguished University Professor * Elected a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the judges of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural knowledge, including mathemat ...

, FRS in 1998 * Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, FRSC *

Canada Research Chair Canada Research Chair (CRC) is a title given to certain Canadian university research professors by the Canada Research Chairs Program. Program goals The Canada Research Chair program was established in 2000 as a part of the Government of Canada ...

* Bucke Science Prize and Hellmuth Prize,

* Alcan Award and E.W.R. Steacie Award of the Chemical Society of Canada * CIC Medal of the

Chemical Institute of Canada A chemical substance is a form of matter having constant chemical composition and characteristic properties. Some references add that chemical substance cannot be separated into its constituent elements by physical separation methods, i.e., wit ...

* Nyholm Lecture Award and Award for Chemistry of the Noble Metals of the

Royal Society of Chemistry The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) is a learned society (professional association) in the United Kingdom with the goal of "advancing the chemical sciences". It was formed in 1980 from the amalgamation of the Chemical Society, the Royal Instit ...

* E.G. Pleva Teaching Award *

NSERC The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC; french: Conseil de recherches en sciences naturelles et en génie du Canada, CRSNG) is the major federal agency responsible for funding natural sciences and engineering rese ...

Award of Excellence ''(2001)''

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Puddephatt, Richard J. 1943 births Living people People from Aylesbury People educated at the Royal Grammar School, High Wycombe Alumni of the University of London Alumni of University College London Officers of the Order of Canada Canada Research Chairs Academic staff of the University of Western Ontario Fellows of the Royal Society of Canada Fellows of the Royal Society