John Meurig Thomas

Early life and education Thomas was born and brought up in the Gwendraeth Valley, Carmarthenshire, Wales, He attended Gwendraeth Grammar School. Thomas earned a BSc degree from the University College of Wales, Swansea (later Swansea University) in 1954. Personal life In 1959, Thomas married Margaret Edwards with whom he had two daughters. Margaret Thomas died in 2002. In April 2010, Thomas married Jehane Ragai of the American University in Cairo; the events took place in Cambridge and London. Thomas demonstrated the profound influence of dislocations and other structural imperfections upon the chemical, electronic, and surface properties of solids. In 1969 Thomas became a Professor and Head of Chemistry at the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, At this time, Thomas began using synchrotron radiation and devised techniques which combine X-ray spectroscopy and high-resolution X-ray diffraction to determine the atomic structure of the active sites of solid catalysts under operating conditions. In 1991 Thomas published the book Michael Faraday and the Royal Institution: The Genius of Man and Place, which has since been translated into Japanese (1994) and Italian (2007). In 1991, Thomas resigned as Director of the Royal Institution and the Davy Faraday Research Laboratory, to be succeeded by Peter Day. Return to Cambridge After a period as Deputy Pro-Chancellor of the University of Wales (1991–1994), Thomas returned to Cambridge in 1993 as Master of Peterhouse, the oldest college of the university. He was the first scientist to hold the position. for work that "has profoundly added to the science-base of heterogeneous catalysis leading to the commercial exploitation of zeolites through engineering processes". Thomas was the author of some thirty patents, He devised single-step, solvent-free processes for the production of caprolactam (the raw material for nylon-6) and vitamin B3 (niacin). Thomas' death was reported on 13 November 2020, aged 87. == Awards and honours ==

Thomas held an Honorary Distinguished Professorship of Materials Chemistry at Cardiff University. He was an Honorary Bencher of Gray's Inn. Thomas received twenty-three honorary degrees He was elected to honorary membership of over fifteen foreign academies, including the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (2013), the American Philosophical Society (1992), the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1990), and the Russian Academy of Sciences (1994). Other awards included the Kapitza Gold Medal from the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences (2011), In 1995 he became the first British scientist in 80 years to be awarded the Willard Gibbs Award by the Chicago Section of the American Chemical Society. In 1967 he was a recipient of the Corday–Morgan Prize. In recognition of his contributions to geochemistry, a new mineral, meurigite, was named after him in 1995 by the International Mineralogical Association. A hydrated potassium iron phosphate, meurigite is described as "tabular, elongated crystals forming spherical and hemispherical clusters and drusy coatings. The colour ranges from creamy white to pale yellow and yellowish brown." His most recent publication is Design and Applications of Single-Site Heterogeneous Catalysts: Contributions to Green Chemistry, Clean Technology and Sustainability (2012) In 2003, he was the first scientist to be awarded the Medal of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion (London) for services to Welsh culture and British public life. and a Member of its inaugural Council. From 2011 he was a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee for Wales. He was an overseer of the Science History Institute (Philadelphia), and a member of the International Advisory Board of the Zewail City of Science and Technology (Egypt). Thomas was appointed as an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering in 2013. In October 2016, the Royal Society awarded Thomas the Royal Medal for Physical Sciences "for his pioneering work within catalytic chemistry, in particular on single-site heterogeneous catalysts, which have had a major impact on green chemistry, clean technology and sustainability." Prince Andrew, Duke of York represented queen Elizabeth II at the ceremony. Also in 2016, the UK Catalysis Hub launched a new medal that "honours the achievements of Sir John Meurig Thomas, a distinguished professor in the field of catalysis." == Selected scientific publications ==

Books • • • • • • • • • Part 1: On the design and application of solid catalysts • Sheet silicates: Broad spectrum catalysts for organic synthesis.(See also U.S. Patent 4,999,319 (1985), which is the basis of the world's largest solvent-free, single-step production of ethyl acetate.) • Uniform heterogeneous catalysts: The role of solid-state chemistry in their development and design. • New micro-crystalline catalysts Bakerian Lecture 1990. • Solid acid catalysts • Heterogeneous catalysts obtained by grafting metallocene complexes onto mesoporous silica • Design, synthesis and in situ characterisation of new solid catalysts (Linus Pauling Lecture, California Institute of Technology, March 1999 and Karl Ziegler Lecture, Max Planck Institute, Mülheim, November 1998.) • Molecular sieve catalysts for the regioselective and shape-selective oxyfunctionalization of alkanes in air • Solvent-free routes to clean technology • Constraining asymmetric organometallic catalysts within mesoporous supports boosts their enantioselectivity • Highly efficient, one-step conversion of cyclohexane to adipic acid using single-site heterogeneous catalysts • Design of a "green" one-step catalytic production of ε-caprolactam (precursor of nylon-6) See also • The advantages and future potential of single-site heterogeneous catalysts • Single-site photocatalytic solids for the decomposition of undesirable molecules (Focus Article) • Innovations in oxidation catalysis leading to a sustainable society • Systematic enumeration of microporous solids: Towards designer catalysts • Facile, one-step production of niacin (vitamin B3) and other nitrogen-containing pharmaceutical chemicals with a single-site heterogeneous catalyst • Nanoporous oxidic solids: The confluence of heterogeneous and homogeneous catalysis(Based on a lecture at the Symposium of Molecular Frontiers held at the Swedish Academy of Sciences in May 2008). • Heterogeneous catalysis: Enigmas, illusions, challenges, realities, and emergent strategies of design • Can a single atom serve as the active site in some heterogeneous catalysts? • The principles of solid state chemistry hold the key to the successful design of heterogeneous catalysts for environmentally responsible processes Part 2: On new techniques • Tracing the conversion of aurichalcite to a copper catalyst by combined X-ray absorption and diffraction • Review lecture: Topography and topology in solid-state chemistry • Resolving crystallographically distinct tetrahedral sites in silicalite and ZSM-5 by solid-state NMR • Revolutionary developments from atomic to extended structural imaging • Nanotomography in the chemical, biological and materials sciences see also • Mono- bi- and multifunctional single sites: exploring the interface between heterogeneous and homogeneous catalysis • The modern electron microscope: A cornucopia of chemico-physical insights == References ==