N e w S l e t t e r o f t h e C h e m i C A l h e r i t A g e f o u N d A t i o N

CHF

No. 13 | Summer 2013

Ten years of Innovation Day: Celebrating visionary support from

Warren and Katharine Schlinger

No. 13 | Summer 2013

Transmutations is a newsletter published three times per year for supporters of CHF.

Comments or questions about this issue?Please contactDavid Haldeman, Communications Coordinator, dhaldeman@chemheritage.org

For information on supporting CHF please contactDenise Creedon, Vice President for Institutional Advancement, dcreedon@chemheritage.org

Chemical Heritage FoundationLIbRARy • MuSeuM • CeNTeR FoR SCHoLARS

315 Chestnut StreetPhiladelphia, PA 19106-2702Phone: 215.925.2222Fax: 215.925.1954chemheritage.org

HouRS

The Museum at CHF Monday–Friday, 10:00 a.m.–4:00 p.m. First Fridays, 10:00 a.m.–8:00 p.m.

The Donald F. and Mildred Topp othmer Library of Chemical History Monday–Friday, 10:00 a.m.–4:00 p.m. (by appointment; schedule at reference@chemheritage.org)

Go to chemheritage.org for

•Chemical Heritage, CHF’s magazine

•Distillations, our award-winning podcast

•ClassroomResources

•EventRegistration

And much more

Also check out CHF on Facebook, Flickr, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Issuu

DeSIGN: WFGD Studio

[oN THe CoVeR] MAIN IMAGe: Over a hundred chemical industry leaders and researchers gather for Innovation Day 2012. Photo by Conrad Erb. LoWeR LeFT: Warren Schlinger speaks at Innovation Day 2004. LoWeR RIGHT: Mary Lowe Good and Uma Chowdhry at the preview of Women in Chemistry: Lessons from Life and the Laboratory at WHYY. Photo by Conrad Erb.

The summer of 2013 is a particularly exciting time for our CHF friends who knew us when we were young. I have had the privilege to meet many of these endur-ing friends—our early founders who quite literally “bought into” Arnold Thackray’s idea that the world needed a Chemical Heritage Foundation. Much has happened since that January in 1982 to establish CHF as the distinctive organization that it is today—where the breadth of chemistry and the depth of history are explored and communicated to an ever-growing audience.

It is well established that nonprofit organizations have identifiable life cycles. Specific events produce a need; people devoted to that need respond by creating an entity that provides a service to meet that need. Time passes. Needs change, entire industries change, social and cultural climates change. (When the idea of CHF was conceived 31 years ago, there were no hybrid automobiles, no iPods or iPads, no genomic-based treatments, no effective HIV/AIDS therapies.) In order to stay vital an organization must monitor itself and continuously refine its mission to ensure that its precious resources—charitable contributions and brilliant ideas from its support-ers and friends—are invested effectively into programs and priorities that meet the demands of a fluid landscape.

So where is CHF on the life-cycle continuum? In many respects we feel very much like a new graduate with all the promise and potential in the world. After the inspired leadership of our second president, Tom Tritton, who retires this summer, the board of directors has chosen Carsten Reinhardt, a prominent historian of chemistry at the Institute for Science and Technology, University of Bielefeld, in Germany. The cycle will continue anew when Reinhardt assumes the post of president and CEO of CHF on August 1. With him, he brings great promise: to continue to harness the passion and energy that caused our founding members to come together, and then to help advance our mission, which is to foster a more profound understanding of the role that the chemical and molecular sciences, technologies, and industries play in shap-ing our world. The summer of 2013 is an exciting time indeed!

Denise Creedon

Vice President for Institutional Advancement

cover story

1

The lab can be an isolating place if you’re a young re-searcher, and an industrial lab even more so. Whereas academic researchers are expected to tout their findings

to anyone who will listen, industrial researchers often must keep their work quiet—a necessary part of staying competitive in a marketplace relentlessly hunting for the next big idea.

“What we hear is that [young researchers working in industry] often don’t travel outside the lab,” says CHF’s Jody Roberts. “They have little opportunity to do research at the peer level or to interact with other young researchers in a smaller group and in a meaningful way.”

Warren Schlinger was once one of these young industry researchers. After receiving his Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology, Schlinger would go on to work for Texaco for 35 years, where he was an innovator in gasification technologies now widely used for production of hydrogen, other chemicals, and power. In 2003, after a long and notable career, Schlinger, along with his wife Katharine, innovated again. To bring young industry researchers out of the lab to learn and share ideas, the former industry researcher commit-ted to CHF a one-million-dollar fund for a pioneering project: Innovation Day.

In an age of rapidly growing interconnectivity and com-plexity, success is increasingly going to those scientists who connect face-to-face with their peers and look beyond only technical matters to become aware of the broader implica-tions of their work. Rather than providing a narrow venue for discussing scientific and technical details, Innovation Day introduces over a hundred young researchers each year to the broad social and regulatory issues inherent in their work, and lets the researchers meet and learn from senior executives and scientists.

“They get [industry information] in Chemical & Engineer-ing News,” says Roberts, “but to hear and interact with other researchers and to step back from their day-to-day lab work is not very common.”

This year marks the tenth anniversary of the Warren and Katharine Schlinger Foundation’s generous gift for Innova-tion Day. “They kick-started the whole thing,” says Roberts,

who along with CHF’s Ron Reynolds organizes the event each year. The Schlinger’s generosity “provides a foundation on which we can build consistency year after year,” he says. “Knowing we have that foundation allows us to experiment and be entrepreneurial.”

Schlinger had 67 patents issued during his career, and he has been honored with the AIChE Technical Achievement Award, with the Chemical Engineering Practice Award, and by the National Academy of Engineering. To honor both his accomplishments and his profoundly important support of CHF, the key component of Innovation Day is named the Schlinger Symposium, a closed event consisting of series of breakout sessions on topics with wide industrial and social implications. The 2012 Schlinger Symposium included such subject areas as bio-based chemical feedstocks, feeding the world’s expanding population, and the future role of bio-energy. The results of the discussions are then published in a white paper for dissemination and study within the chemical industry.

“We don’t pick the topics for them,” said Roberts. Rather than the agenda being top down, he says, topics are selected through surveys conducted at the end of each symposium.

“The participants themselves pick what’s useful. That’s why it’s been so successful.”

In addition to the Schlinger Symposium, Innovation Day features an opening plenary, a poster session, and the pre-sentation of two medals by the Society of Chemical Industry (SCI), which partners with CHF on the event: the Gordon E. Moore Medal and the Perkin Medal. Innovation Day takes place this year on September 16 and 17.

“It seems the techniques and developments in chem-istry and chemical engineering are just advancing so fast,” Schlinger said in an interview with CalTech shortly before CHF’s inaugural Innovation Day. Once a young industry re-searcher himself, Schlinger has decided to use his generosity to give back—and help other scientists feel a little less isolated in a rapidly advancing world.For more information about supporting CHF, contact Denise Creedon at 215.873.8266 or dcreedon@chemheritage.org.

Innovation Day

Ten years ago, Warren and Katharine Schlinger

laid the foundation for a new kind of event

[LeFT] Warren and Katharine Schlinger at Innovation Day 2006. [AboVe] Chemical industry researchers at the poster session for Innovation Day 2012.

Pho

to b

y Co

nra

d E

rb

In our oral history collection we have the adventurous life story of George Rosenkranz. An organic chemist and a pioneer in steroidal research, Rosen-kranz left his native Hungary in 1939 and eventually found his way to a small Mexican company named Syntex, which he would eventually lead as CEO and build into an international pharma-ceutical enterprise.

As director of research at Syntex, Rosenkranz demonstrated three impor-tant skills: the ability to creatively apply his broad knowledge of chemistry; an aptitude for mentoring and develop-ing the skills of young scientists; and enormous charm, which he used to at-tract talented and established scientists to his research team. The outcome was the oral contraceptive and other steroid drugs, the development of innovative techniques for extracting steroidal ma-terial from plants, and lifelong friend-

schon abgegrast.’ (‘Rosenkranz, leave the steroids alone, everything has already been grazed.’). You know, like the cows that eat all the grass. My response to this is I came to Mexico; I became in-volved in steroids, and look what hap-pened. Cortisone appeared, and all the other drugs. […] There is never an end. There is always something new that comes along.”

To support CHF’s oral-history program, please contact Richard Ulrych at 215.873.8286 or rulrych@chemheritage.org.

* Leopold Ružicka, of the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule in Switzerland and winner of the 1939 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

George Rosenkranz

2

fellow in focus

The sun and moon joust while riding a lion and a griffin. A hermaphrodite stands atop a pile of decaying eagles while a phoenix rises. A serpent de-capitates two heavenly bodies while flowers burn in a nearby pot.

This was chemistry.More specifically, these images,

from the 15th-century illuminated manuscript Aurora consurgens, are al-chemical formulas written in code. While alchemy was often considered the profession of fools and charla-tans, the techniques used by alchemists would eventually lead to real scientific

breakthroughs. Throughout its long history alchemy has been banned at various times; so its adherents turned to symbolism to secretly circulate their findings. The result is a rich trove of illustrations and texts filled with bizarre, fanci-ful, morbid, and often highly sexual imagery.

Joel Klein, CHF’s current Sidney Edelstein Dissertation Fellow, has been using this surreal and fascinating aspect of chemical history to engage a general audience. During his tenure at CHF he has taken to lecturing and appearing on CHF’s podcast, Distillations, and before he came to CHF, he spoke on alchemy in the Harry Potter series.

Joel Klein

Joel Klein.

oral history Spotlight

“It’s fun to take these as-pects of your work that can reach a broader audience and use it to draw people in to the history of science,” says Klein.

It was while he was working on an undergraduate degree in chemistry that he realized he

was attracted to the history of science. “I’ve always been very interested in the humanities,” says Klein. “While I enjoyed working as a chemist, I was more interested in the question of ‘how did we get somewhere,’” he says.

Klein is currently working on a Ph.D. in the history and philosophy of science at Indiana University, where he is writing a dissertation on Daniel Sennert, a prominent 17th-century physician and chemist who developed one of the first coherent theories of atomism.

Klein came to CHF in September, after having spent two years in Germany. The Othmer Library has permitted him to be part of a specific scholarly community.

“I’m with a group of individuals working on a wide vari-ety of topics in the history of science,” says Klein. “It’s great having people to bounce ideas off of.”

Hear more from Joel Klein about the strange symbolism of alchemy in Distillations #166: Alchemy after Dark, available at chemheritage.org or on iTunes.

George Rosenkranz.

TrAnSmuTIng Alchemy’S lurID SIDe InTo An InTereST In The hISTory of ScIence

There IS AlWAyS SomeThIng neW ThAT comeS Along

The alchemy code: an image from the Aurora consurgens.

ships with the vast network of scientists who once worked at Syntex.

The oral history of George Rosen-kranz recorded in 1997 is a wonderful summary of his extraordinary life—a life of adventure (and of some danger) that brought him from Hungary to Swit-zerland to Cuba and then eventually to Mexico and the United States. As with many oral histories it contains several nuggets of wisdom, one of which is the following: when asked by the in-terviewer what Rosenkranz thought of the premise of the book The End of Science, which argues that all the great discoveries in science have already been made, Rosenkranz said, “My reaction is it’s absurd. Your question reminds me of something I forgot to mention to you earlier. When I left Switzerland, and I said goodbye to [my doctoral adviser] Ružicka*, he told me […], ‘Rosenkranz, lassen sie die Steroide in Ruhe, alles ist

Pho

to b

y Co

nra

d E

rb

Eugene Garfield changed the world of science as pro-foundly as the internal combustion engine changed transportation. In 1964 he created the Science Cita-tion Index (SCI) that allows scientists to see how academic papers are cited by other researchers. Soon he added Social Science and Arts and Humanities Citation Indexes, as his influence spread across the academic world.

This year, nearly a half century after Garfield’s innovative indexes made history, he created the Eu-gene Garfield Grants Program at CHF. The program includes four fellowships for study of the history of information science, law, documentation, and chemi-cal engineering.

Since 2011 CHF has had the largest private fellow-ship program in the history of science and technology in the United States. The Garfield Grants Program further strengthens CHF’s leadership position.

We’d love to discuss how CHF can direct your philanthropic support to projects like our fellowship program. Please contact Denise Creedon at 215.873.8266 or dcreedon@chemheritage.org.

The Eugene Garfield Grants Programeugene gArfIelD chAngeD ScIence forever. noW he’S helPIng TrAnSform chf’S felloWShIP ProgrAm.

The fellowship topics exemplify Garfield’s entrepreneur-ial spirit and wide-ranging curiosity, and underline his many contributions to the scientific enterprise:

THeoDoRe AND MARy HeRDeGeN FeLLoWSHIPS IN THe HISToRy oF SCIeNTIFIC INFoRMATIoN

The Theodore and Mary Herdegen Fellowships are for scholars researching the production, transmission, and/or organization of scientific information. Preference is given to fellows focused on chemical information.

NoSHIR T. MISTRy FeLLoWSHIP IN THe HISToRy oF CHeMICAL eNGINeeRING

The Noshir T. Mistry Fellow honors a distinguished chemical engineer and focuses on that field, including environmental engineering.

PAuL oTLeT FeLLoWSHIP IN THe HISToRy oF INFoRMATIoN SCIeNCe

The Paul Otlet Fellow will conduct research on documenta-tion and its role in enabling and disseminating scientific discovery. Preference may be given to work on information science before 1944; on the Internet; or on the political dimensions of science documentation.

RAqueL AND ARTHuR SeIDeL FeLLoWSHIP IN THe HISToRy oF INTeLLeCTuAL PRoPeRTy AND PATeNTS

The Raquel and Arthur Seidel Fellow will work at the inter-section of the chemical sciences and the law, on issues of scientific progress as it relates to discovery, patenting, com-mercialization, and public perception.

3

fundraising feature

[ToP] Meher Mistry and Eugene Garfield. [boTToM] Left to Right: CHF Fellows David Singerman, Andrew Butrica, Laura Kalba, Ian Beamish, Deanna Day, and Benjamin Gross; with Carin Berkowitz, director of the Beck-man Center; and CHF Fellow Joel Klein.

Pho

to b

y Co

nra

d E

rb

Pho

to b

y Co

nra

d E

rb

donor profileIrénée du Pont, Jr.

Synthesizing Support

4

See our environment with freSh eyeS. Sensing Change presents art inspired by scientific investi-

gations, historical accounts, and direct observations of the

natural world.

Log on to chemheritage.org/SensingChange for interviews

with featured artists, oral histories of atmospheric scientists,

and the stories behind instruments that measure environ-

mental change.

CLifford C. haCh GaLLEry thE MusEuM at Chf

July 1, 2013–may 2, 2014Pho

to b

y KE

vin

KEn

nEf

iCK

When you think of the American chem-ical industry, the name DuPont imme-diately comes to mind. Founded by Éleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours in 1802, E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company began production in 1803 and became a major manufacturer of gunpowder. After E. I. du Pont’s death in 1834 his sons and then later gen-erations of du Ponts led the company and built it into a prosperous chemical enterprise, providing products essential for the development and defense of the United States. After 1940 the family became less conspicuous at the high-est executive level of the company, but many descendants of E. I. du Pont remained among the ranks of employ-ees. One such individual was Irénée du Pont, Jr., great great grandson of the company founder, who after graduating from MIT with a degree in mechanical engineering, came to work at the family firm and eventually rose to the position of senior vice president and member of the Executive Committee.

Given the rich chemical heritage of his family, it is not surprising that Irénée du Pont, Jr., became an early and important supporter of CHF. He was among the very first to see the value of

an organization that puts the chemical en-terprise in a proper perspective, herald-ing the achievements and contributions of the pioneers of the chemical sciences in the United States.

This support has been manifested in many ways. His fi-nancial support has made it possible for CHF’s headquarters at 315 Chestnut Street to become the jewel box of the chemical com-munity. Never one to put the spotlight on himself, he has gladly brought recognition to his most distin-guished ancestor: his generosity led to the creation of the Éleuthère Irénée du Pont Lobby/Reception Center and to the E. I. du Pont Conference Center.

Irénée du Pont, Jr.’s, beneficence has also been manifested in other ways. Numerous times he has hosted CHF events at his home. Through his gra-cious hospitality we have gained new

friends and solidified the support of existing constituents. Irénée du Pont, Jr., has also been generous with his good counsel and advice, helping CHF in the early days to define its mission and develop vital connections with the local chemical community.

Richard Ulrych, Director of Institu-tional Grants and Strategic Projects

Irénée du Pont, Jr., along with CHF Chan-cellor Arnold Thackeray, examine a model of CHF’s headquarters in Philadelphia.

Pho

to b

y st

EvEn

h. b

EGLE

itEr

5

recent events[1] Frank Laukien, CEO of Bruker Corporation, accepts the 2013 Pittcon heritage Award on behalf of his father, Günther Laukien. The award was bestowed on Günther Lauk-ien posthumously on March 17, 2013, during the Pittsburgh Conference on Analytical Chemistry and Applied Spectros-copy (Pittcon) in Philadelphia. Laukien was an experimental physicist, an entrepreneur, and the chief founder of Bruker Physik AG (now the Bruker Corporation). [2] heritage Day 2013 celebrated achievement in chemistry and related sci-ences. From left to right: Jacqueline Dorrance, executive director and CEO, Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation; Harry Gray, Arnold O. Beckman Professor of Chemistry, Cali-fornia Institute of Technology, and winner of the 2013 Oth-mer Gold Medal at Heritage Day 2013; Roy Eddleman, CEO and founder of Spectrum Laboratories; and Denise Creedon, vice president for institutional advancement at CHF. [3] Alan Walton (left), senior general partner at Oxford Bioscience Partners, was presented the Richard J. Bolte, Sr., Award for Supporting Industries at heritage Day 2013. The award was presented by Richard J. Bolte, Jr. (right), president and CEO of BDP International. [4] In honor of Women’s History Month, CHF partnered with public-TV station WHYY to present an hour-long television special on March 27, 2013, based on The catalyst film Series: Women in chemistry. Following a screening at WHYY, two of the women featured, pioneering chemists Mary Lowe Good and Uma Chowdhry, participated in a panel discussion. Good (left) is the former undersecretary of technology under President Bill Clinton. Chowdhry (right) is chief science and technology officer emeritus at DuPont. [5] John D. Roberts, Institute Professor of Chemistry, Emeritus, California Institute of Technology, and winner of the 2013 AIC Gold Medal at heritage Day 2013, with CHF board chair Laurie Landeau. [6] heritage Day 2013: George Whitesides, professor of chemistry at Harvard University, joins Tranda Fischelis, communications and training manager; Harry Gray; and John Baldeschwieler, J. Stanley Johnson Professor and Professor of Chemistry Emeritus, California Institute of Technology, and member of CHF’s board of directors.

dynamic engagement

[1] [2]

[3] [4]

[5] [6]

Thanks to the generosity of bNy Mellon Wealth Management and DuPont, the crowd at a First Friday event sees the sweet side of chemistry. Visitors learned the science and techniques behind old-fashioned confectionery, complete with antique Victorian molds.

aLL

Ph

oto

s by

Co

nra

d E

rb E

xCEP

t [2

] by

da

niE

L bu

rKE.

Pho

to b

y Co

nra

d E

rb

Visit chemheritage.org

for further information and

registration details.

Follow CHF on

Events

First Friday at CHF

August 2

First Friday at CHF

September 6

Science on Tap

September 9

Joseph Priestley Society Luncheon Speaker: A. N. Sreeram, The Dow Chemical Company

September 12

Joseph Priestley Society Symposium Speaker: Andrew Place, Center for Sustainable Shale Development

October 17

T. T. Chao Symposium (Houston)

October 24

Richard Holmes lecture: Falling Up

October 30

Joseph Priestley Society Luncheon Speaker: John Felmy, American Petroleum Institute

November 14

Rohm and Haas Fellow in Focus Lecture: Robert Fox

November 14

Sensing Change

Through May 2014

Making Modernity

Ongoing

Transmutations: Alchemy in Art

Ongoing

The Whole of Nature and the Mirror of Art: Images of Alchemy

Ongoing

Chemical Heritage FoundationLIbRARy • MuSeuM • CeNTeR FoR SCHoLARS

315 Chestnut StreetPhiladelphia, PA 19106-2702chemheritage.org

NON PROFIT ORGANIZATION

U.S.POSTAGE

P A I D

BENSALEM PA PERMIT NO. 118

Exhibits

An audience watches a screening of Women in Chemistry: Lessons from Life and the Laboratory at WHYY, Philadel-phia’s public television station.

The Chemical Heritage Foundation

is a collections-based nonprofit

organization that preserves the

history and heritage of chemistry,

chemical engineering, and related

sciences and technologies. The col-

lections are used to create a body of

original scholarship that illuminates

chemistry’s role in shaping society.

In bridging science with the humani-

ties, arts, and social sciences, CHF

is committed to building a vibrant,

international community of scholars;

creating a rich source of traditional

and emerging media; expanding the

reach of our museum; and engaging

the broader society through inventive

public events.

Pho

to b

y Co

nra

d E

rb