FL Award | American Chemical Society

Purpose

To recognize leadership and contributions toward the advancement of the profession of chemistry.

Establishment and Support

The award was established in 1952 by vote of the Florida Section of the American Chemical Society and has been given each year since then at the annual scientific meeting of the Florida Sections.

Nature

The award consists of a plaque and $500, plus hotel and registration for the purpose of attending the meeting to receive the award and to give an address. The Florida Section of the American Chemical Society will also provide up to $500 in support of the symposium centered around the award recipient’s research interests. This specially organized symposium will be part of the Florida Annual Meeting and Exposition that is held in May/June each year unless the spring national ACS meeting is held in Orlando.

Rules of Eligibility

A nominee must be a resident of the Southeastern United States and must have made outstanding contributions to teaching, research, publications or service in advancing the profession. The award recipient gives an address at the Annual Meeting.

To Submit a Nomination

The nominator should obtain the consent of the nominee. A nomination package should then be e-mailed as a single PDF file to Professor George Christou (christou@chem.ufl.edu). A complete nomination package should consist of:

a nomination letter that outlines the nominee’s qualifications and contributions to the profession, two seconding letters of support for the nomination, and a copy of the nominee’s current curriculum vitae.

Nomination forms and seconding letters must be received by Monday, December 5, 2024.

Note: The 2024 Florida Annual Meeting and Exposition (FAME 2024) will be held May 30, – June 2nd at Innisbrook Resort and Golf Club near Tampa, FL. The award recipient for 2024 to give an address at the meeting during symposium related to their recipient’s research interests. Nominators should confirm that the nominee can be present to participate in the meeting program and to receive the Award.

2024 FL Award Recipient

Congratulations to Prof. Brent Sumerlin
Department of Chemistry
University of Florida

Brent Sumerlin is the George Bergen Butler Chair in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Florida. He received his undergraduate degree from North Carolina State University in 1998 and later earned his PhD in Polymer Science & Engineering at the University of Southern Mississippi under the guidance of Charles McCormick. After completing his PhD, Sumerlin worked as a Visiting Assistant Professor/Postdoctoral Research Associate at Carnegie Mellon University under Krzysztof Matyjaszewski. In 2005, he took a faculty position at Southern Methodist University before moving to the University of Florida in 2012. Sumerlin is an associate editor for ACS Macro Letters and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry. He has received awards, including the Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship, NSF CAREER Award, ACS Leadership Development Award, Journal of Polymer Science Innovation Award, Biomacromolecules/Macromolecules Young Investigator Award, the Hanwha-Total IUPAC Award, and the UF Doctoral Dissertation Mentoring/Advising Award.

2023 FL Award Recipient

2022 FL Award Recipient

Congratulations to Prof. Igor V. Albugin
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry
Florida State University
Tallahassee, FL USA

The Florida Award selection committee recognizes Professor Johnson for his contributions to Physical Organic chemistry, along with major impacts in teaching and service to the larger chemistry community. Igor V. Alabugin is the Distinguished Research Professor at the Florida State University, Tallahassee, Fl. He received his Ph.D. degree from the Moscow State University in 1995 under the supervision of Professors N. S. Zefirov, N. V. Zyk, and V. K. Brel. After completing postdoctoral studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison with Professor H. E. Zimmerman, he joined the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry of the Florida State University in 2000. He currently serves as Associate Editor for the Journal of Physical Organic Chemistry, as the US representative in the IUPAC Subcommittee on Structural and Mechanistic Chemistry, and in the advisory boards of several journals and conferences.

His research combines theoretical and experimental organic chemistry. It ranges from electronic and conformational control of cycloaromatization reactions of enediynes to transition state stabilization in “click” cycloadditions, construction of carbon-rich nanostructures via cascade transformations of alkynes, radical cyclizations and fragmentations including the first metal-free conversion of phenols into esters and amides of aromatic carboxylic acids, photochemical double-stranded DNA cleavage agents with built-in selectivity to cancer cells, fundamental understanding of alkyne cyclizations, exergonic transformation of weak reductants into stronger reductants (“electron upconversion”), and design of unusually stable organic peroxides. Underlying much of this chemistry are Alabugin’s contributions to a deeper understanding of stereoelectronic effects.

Dr. Alabugin is the first recipient of all three FSU Undergraduate Awards: Teaching, Advising, and Research Mentor. His recent awards include the Markovnikov Medal, ACS Cope Scholar Award, AAAS and Fulbright Fellowships.

For more information visit: https://www.chem.fsu.edu/~alabugin/

2021 FL Award Recipient

2020 FL Award Recipient

2019 FL Award Recipient

2018 FL Award Recipient

Congratulations to Prof. Kevin M. Smith
Department of Chemistry
Louisiana State University
Baton Rouge, LA USA
The Florida Award selection committee recognizes Professor Smith for his contributions to organic and biological chemistry, specifically porphyrin chemistry. Professor Smith began his long and distinguished career at the University of Liverpool as a Lecturer (1969-1977) and continued at the University of California Davis, from 1977 to 2001, where he maintained a large research group and served a number of administrative roles, including Department Chair and Vice Chancellor for Research. He came to Louisiana State University in August 2001 as Vice Chancellor for Research and Dean of the Graduate School. He held that position until 2005 and, throughout his time at LSU, he has been the LSU Foundation James C. Bolton Distinguished Professor.

Professor Smith is an outstanding researcher, with 783 publications to-date and an h-index of 75. His expertise is in organic and bioorganic chemistry; his name is synonymous with the field of porphyrin chemistry. One of his colleagues, also a leader in porphyrin chemistry, stated “Prof. Smith is the best porphyrin chemist alive and richly deserving of this high honor. He has been a leader, teacher, mentor, and inspiration for all of us who work in the field.” In recognition of these accomplishments, he received the Robert B. Woodward Lifetime Achievement Award in Porphyrin Chemistry (ICPP-4, Rome, Italy, 2006) and the Alfred Bader Award in Bioinorganic or Bioorganic Chemistry (ACS National Meeting, Salt Lake City, Utah, 2009). In 2014, he was honored at the 8th International Conference in Porphyrins and Phthalocyanines (ICPP-8) in Istanbul, Turkey, for his contributions over the past 50 years as a teacher, mentor and researcher, with a two-day symposium and dinner organized and attended by over 100 of his former and current mentees.

For more information visit: https://sites01.lsu.edu/faculty/kmsmith/

2017 FL Award Recipient

Congratulations to Prof. David N. Beratan
Department of Chemistry
Duke University
Durham, NC USA
The Florida Award selection committee recognizes Professor Beratan for his contributions to theoretical biophysics and biophysical chemistry, along with major impacts in teaching and service to the larger chemistry community. Professor Beratan is a leading researcher, teacher, and chemist, and it is our honor to present him with the 2017 Florida Award.
Professor Beratan received a B. S. degree from Duke University in 1980 and a Ph. D. in Chemistry from the California Institute of Technology in 1986. He began his independent career at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in 1987 before moving to the University of Pittsburgh in 1992, where he rose through the ranks to become a full professor in 1997. In 2001, Professor Beratan joined the faculty at Duke University, where his theoretical work continues to have a transformative impact on modern chemistry, particularly the fields of biochemistry and biophysical chemistry.
Professor Beratan is the recipient of a number of other national and regional awards, including recognition as an Elected Fellow for the Royal Society of Chemistry (2013), the American Chemical Society (2013), the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2002), and the American Physical Society (2001). Other recent awards include the Charles H. Herty Medal of the Georgia section of the ACS (2015), as well as the Feynman Prize for Nanoscience (Theory) from the Foresight Institute (2013).

2016 FL Award Recipient

Congratulations to Prof. Richard D. Adams
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry
University of South Carolina
Columbia, SC USA
Richard D. Adams received a B. S. degree from the Pennsylvania State University in 1969 and a Ph. D. in chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1973 for research in inorganic chemistry performed under the direction of F. A. Cotton. He was an Assistant Professor of Chemistry at the State University of New York at Buffalo, 1973-75 and Assistant and Associate Professor at Yale University, 1975-84. In 1984 he moved to the University of South Carolina as Professor of Chemistry. In 1995 he was appointed as the Arthur S. Williams Professor of Chemistry, and in 2006 he was appointed Carolina Distinguished Professor. He is the recipient of a number of national and regional awards including the 1999 ACS Award for Inorganic Chemistry and the 2010 ACS Award for Distinguished Service in the Advancement of Inorganic Chemistry. He also received the Charles H. Herty Medal of the Georgia section of the ACS; the Charles H. Stone award of the Carolina-Piedmont section of the ACS, and a Pioneer award from the American Institute of Chemists. He has also received the Outstanding South Carolina Chemist award by the South Carolina Section of the ACS, 2001; the Southern Chemist Award from Memphis Section of the ACS, 2001, and the South Carolina Governor’s Award for Excellence in Science, 2003. He received the Henry J. Albert Award of the International Precious Metals Institute in 2005. He received the 2011 Distinguished Scientist Award of the Southeastern Universities Research Association. He is the American Regional Editor for the Journal of Organometallic Chemistry and a coeditor of the Journal of Cluster Science. He coeditor and coauthor of two texts, “The Chemistry of Metal Cluster Complexes, 1990” with Du Shriver and Herb Kaesz and “Catalysis by Di- and Polynuclear Metal Cluster Complexes, 1998” with F. A. Cotton. His research interests lie in the synthesis, structures and catalytic properties of metal carbonyl cluster complexes and bimetallic nanoparticles. He is the author/coauthor of over 570 original research publications.

Previous FL Award Recipients

1952 Paul Gross (Duke University)
1953 A. E. Wood (University of Mississippi)
1954 C. B. Pollard (University of Florida)
1955 H. E. Skipper (Southern Research Institute)
1956 George K. Davis (University of Florida)
1957 C. R. Hauser (Duke University)
1958 Karl Dittmer (Florida State University)
1959 J. E. Hawkins (University of Florida)
1960 H. H. Sisler (University of Florida)
1961 Michael Kasha (Florida State University)
1962 Jack Hine (Georgia Institute of Technology)
1963 George Butler (University of Florida)
1964 C. T. Bahner (Carson-Newman College)
1965 Werner Herz (Florida State University)
1966 Paul Tarrant (University of Florida)
1967 O. K. Rice (University of North Carolina)
1968 Earl Frieden (Florida State University)
1969 John Baxter (University of Florida)
1970 S. P. McGlynn (Louisiana State University))
1971 Ray Lawrence (USDA Naval Stores Laboratory)
1972 James V. Quagliano (Florida State University)
1973 Gregory Choppin (Florida State University)
1974 Sidney Fox (University of Miami)
1975 Dean F. Martin (University of South Florida)
1976 William Jones (University of Florida)
1977 Cecil Criss (University of Miami)
1978 Harry Walborsky (Florida State University)
1979 Mary Good (Louisiana State University)
1980 Raymond Sheline (Florida State University)
1981 Wallace Brey (University of Florida)
1982 ames D. Winefordner (University of Florida)
1983 Theodore A. Ashford (University of South Florida)
1984 Leo Mandelkern (Florida State University)
1985 Brian Stevens (University of South Florida)
1986 Harry P. Schultz (University of Miami)
1987 DeLos F. DeTar (Florida State University)
1988 Edward K. Mellon (Florida State University)
1989 William R. Dolbier (University of Florida)
1990 R. Bruce King (University of Georgia)
1991 George R. Newkome (University of South Florida)
1992 Charles E. Carraher (Florida Atlantic University)
1993 Norman L. Allinger (University of Georgia)
1994 Albert Padwa (Emory University)
1995 Alan R. Katritzky (University of Florida)
1996 Luis Echegoyen (University of Miami)
1997 N. Yngve Öhrn (University of Florida)
1998 Jack Saltiel (Florida State University)
1999 Mostafa El-Sayed (Georgia Institute of Technology)
2000 Rodney J. Bartlett (University of Florida)
2001 Thomas J. Vickers (Florida State University)
2002 Alan G. Marshall (Florida State University)
2003 Kenneth B. Wagener (University of Florida)
2004 John G. Dorsey (Florida State University)
2005 Charles R. (Martin University of Florida)
2006 Roger M. Leblanc (University of Miami)
2007 Naresh Dalal (Florida State University)
2008 George Christou (University of Florida)
2009 Kirk S. Schanze (University of Florida)
2010 Timothy Cross (Florida State University)
2011 Frank Millero (University of Miami)
2012 Weihong Tan (University of Florida)
2013 Joe Schlenoff (Florida State University)
2014 Weitao Yang (Duke University)
2015 Lisa McElwee-White (University of Florida)
2016 Richard D. Adams (University of South Carolina)

2017 David N. Beratan Duke University

2018 Kevin M. Smith Louisiana State University

2019 John R. Reynolds Georgia Institute of Technology

2020 Brian C. Benicewicz University of South Carolina

2021 Jeffrey Johnson University of NC Chapel Kill

2022 Igor Alabugin Florida State University

2023 Michael Therien Duke Universtiy

2024 Brent Sumerlin University of Florida