F. Gordon A. Stone | |
---|---|
Born | May 19, 1925 Exeter, Devon, UK |
Died | April 6, 2011 Waco, Texas, USA |
(aged 85)
Nationality | British and American |
Institutions | Bristol University, Baylor University |
Alma mater | Cambridge University |
Doctoral advisor | Emeléus |
Francis Gordon Albert Stone CBE, FRS, FRSC (May 19, 1925 – April 6, 2011) was an English chemist who was a prolific and decorated scholar. He specialized in the synthesis of main group and transition metal organometallic compounds. He received his B.A. in 1948 and Ph.D. in 1951, both from Cambridge University, England, where he studied under Harry Julius Emeléus. He was the Robert A. Welch Distinguished Professor of Chemistry at Baylor University until 2010, but his most productive period was as head of Inorganic Chemistry at Bristol University (1963-1990), where he published hundreds of papers over the course of 27 years. In research he competed with his contemporary Geoffrey Wilkinson.
Among the many foci of his studies were complexes of fluorocarbon, isocyanide, polyolefin, alkylidene and alkylidyne ligands. At Baylor, he maintained a research program on boron hydrides, a lifelong interest.[1]
He authored the autobiographic Leaving No Stone Unturned. With Wilkinson, he edited the influential series Comprehensive Organometallic Chemistry. With Robert West, he edited the series Advances in Organometallic Chemistry.
The Gordon Stone Lecture series at the University of Bristol is named in his honour[2]