William von Eggers Doering (June 22, 1917 – January 3, 2011) was the Mallinckrodt Professor of

Chemistry Chemistry is the scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a physical science within the natural sciences that studies the chemical elements that make up matter and chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules a ...

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

. Before Harvard, he taught at Columbia (1942–1952) and

Yale Yale University is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, and one of the nine colonial colleges ch ...

(1952–1968). Doering was born in Fort Worth, Texas to academics Carl Rupp Doering and Antoinette Mathilde von Eggers, both of whom were professors at

Texas Christian University Texas Christian University (TCU) is a private university, private research university in Fort Worth, Texas, United States. It was established in 1873 by brothers Addison Clark, Addison and Randolph Clark as the AddRan Male & Female College. It i ...

. His maternal great-uncle was the prominent German financier and economist

Hjalmar Schacht Horace Greeley Hjalmar Schacht (); 22 January 1877 – 3 June 1970) was a German economist, banker, politician, and co-founder of the German Democratic Party. He served as the Currency Commissioner and President of the Reichsbank during the ...

, sometime President of the ''

Reichsbank The ''Reichsbank'' (; ) was the central bank of the German Empire from 1876 until the end of Nazi Germany in 1945. Background The monetary institutions in Germany had been unsuited for its economic development for several decades before unifica ...

'' and cabinet minister in

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...

. Doering was an undergraduate at Harvard University, where he took courses with some of the leading organic chemists at the time, including

Louis Fieser Louis Frederick Fieser (April 7, 1899 – July 25, 1977) was an American organic chemist, professor, and in 1968, professor emeritus at Harvard University. His award-winning research included work on blood-clotting agents including the first ...

and

Paul Doughty Bartlett Paul Doughty Bartlett (August 14, 1907 – October 11, 1997) was an American chemist. Life and career Bartlett was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan and grew up in Indianapolis. He received his B.A. from Amherst College in 1928. After his graduation ...

. He stayed at Harvard for his graduate education, where he studied catalytic hydrogenation under Reginald Linstead, completing his PhD in 1943. Before beginning his independent career, he became famous for completing a (formal)

quinine total synthesis The total synthesis of quinine, a naturally-occurring antimalarial drug, was developed over a 150-year period. The development of synthetic quinine is considered a milestone in organic chemistry although it has never been produced industrially as ...

with

Robert Burns Woodward Robert Burns Woodward (April 10, 1917 – July 8, 1979) was an American organic chemist. He is considered by many to be the preeminent synthetic organic chemist of the twentieth century, having made many key contributions to the subject, esp ...

as a postdoctoral scholar, a wartime achievement that was publicized at the time by the national news media, including TIME magazine. Subsequently, during an independent career at Columbia, Yale, and Harvard that spanned over half a century, he made numerous contributions to the field of

physical organic chemistry Physical organic chemistry, a term coined by Louis Hammett in 1940, refers to a discipline of organic chemistry that focuses on the relationship between chemical structures and chemical reaction, reactivity, in particular, applying experimental to ...

. Having published his first scientific paper in 1939 and his last in 2008, he holds the rare distinction of having authored scholarly articles in eight different decades. In 1989, he received the "James Flack Norris Award in Physical Organic Chemistry" of the

American Chemical Society The American Chemical Society (ACS) is a scientific society based in the United States that supports scientific inquiry in the field of chemistry. Founded in 1876 at New York University, the ACS currently has more than 155,000 members at all ...

and in 1990 the Robert A. Welch Award in Chemistry. Some of his major contributions include recognition of the aromatic nature of the

tropylium cation The tropylium ion or cycloheptatrienyl cation is an aromatic species with a formula of 7H7sup>+. Its name derives from the molecule tropine from which cycloheptatriene (tropylidene) was first synthesized in 1881. Salts of the tropylium cation ...

and the early use of ¹H NMR for the characterization of carbocations and other reactive intermediates, including heptamethylbenzenium cation, investigation of the stereochemistry of the

Cope rearrangement A cope ( ("rain coat") or ("cape")) is a liturgical long mantle or cloak, open at the front and fastened at the breast with a band or clasp. It may be of any liturgical colour. A cope may be worn by any rank of the Catholic or Anglican cler ...

, and pioneering work in

carbene In organic chemistry, a carbene is a molecule containing a neutral carbon atom with a Valence (chemistry), valence of two and two unshared valence electrons. The general formula is or where the R represents substituents or hydrogen atoms. Th ...

chemistry, including the discovery of

dichlorocarbene Dichlorocarbene is the reactive intermediate with chemical formula CCl2. Although this chemical species has not been isolated, it is a common intermediate in organic chemistry, being generated from chloroform. This bent diamagnetic molecule rapi ...

. Some other notable work include the synthesis of

fulvalene Fulvalene (bicyclopentadienylidene) is the member of the fulvalene family with the molecular formula C10H8. It is of theoretical interest as one of the simplest non-benzenoid conjugated hydrocarbons. Fulvalene is an unstable isomer of the mor ...

, the discoveries of the Doering-LaFlamme allene synthesis and the Parikh-Doering oxidation, prediction of the existence of

bullvalene Bullvalene is a hydrocarbon with the chemical formula . The molecule has a cage-like structure formed by the fusion of one cyclopropane and three cyclohepta-1,4-diene rings. Bullvalene is unusual as an organic molecule due to the and bonds fo ...

as a

fluxional molecule In chemistry and molecular physics, fluxional (or non-rigid) molecules are molecules that undergo dynamics such that some or all of their atoms interchange between symmetry-equivalent positions. Because virtually all molecules are fluxional in som ...

, and elucidation of the mechanism of the

Baeyer–Villiger oxidation The Baeyer–Villiger oxidation is an organic reaction that forms an ester from a ketone or a lactone from a cyclic ketone, using peroxyacids or peroxides as the oxidant. The reaction is named after Adolf von Baeyer and Victor Villiger who first ...

. Together with H. H. Zeiss, he proposed the Doering-Zeiss mechanistic hypothesis for solvolysis reactions. He first articulated the notion that cyclic systems with (4''n'' + 2) π-electrons exhibit aromatic stability (the modern form of

Hückel's rule In organic chemistry, Hückel's rule predicts that a planar ring molecule will have aromatic properties if it has 4''n'' + 2 π-electrons, where ''n'' is a non-negative integer. The quantum mechanical basis for its formulation was f ...

) and coined the term "carbene" in collaboration with Woodward and Winstein during a nocturnal cab ride in Chicago. Doering became

emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". In some c ...

in 1986, but continued to advise graduate students and publish.

Notes

References

* Daintith, John
''Biographical encyclopedia of scientists''
CRC Press, 1994.

External links

William von Eggers Doering
– Michigan State University {{DEFAULTSORT:Doering, William Von Eggers 1917 births Harvard University faculty American chemists Scientists from Fort Worth, Texas 2011 deaths Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Columbia University faculty Yale University faculty Harvard University alumni