Franz Sondheimer

Franz Sondheimer (17 May 1926-11 February 1981) was a British chemist.

Biography

Early life

Sondheimer was born in Stuttgart, Germany in 1926 and, following the rise of the Nazis, fled to the United Kingdom in 1937.

Education

He was a pupil at Highgate School and subsequently studied chemistry, receiving his degree from Imperial College London.

Career

From 1949 to 1952, Sondheimer was a Research Fellow, Harvard University.

From 1952 to 1956, he was employed by Syntex SA, Mexico City, as Associate Director of Research.

In 1956, he moved to Israel and became Head of the Organic Chemistry Department at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot from 1956 to 1964. In 1960, he was appointed Rebecca and Israel Sieff Professor of Organic Chemistry at the institute, until 1964. While in Israel, he also held the post of Vice-President, Research, of Syntex SA from 1961 to 1963

After a stay of eight years, Sondheimer returned from Israel to Britain in 1964, and was appointed as Royal Society Research Professor, at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge, both from 1964 to 1967. In May 1967 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. His membership citation read: Professor Sondheimer is distinguished for his work on the total synthesis of a range of natural products, the partial synthesis of steroid hormones and analogues, and especially for his syntheses of the hitherto unknown class of conjugated unsaturated macrocyclic compounds which has led to some interesting theoretical conclusions. On these topics he has so far published 167 papers.

From 1967 to 1981 he was Royal Society Research Professor, University College London. He died in 1981 while spending a sabbatical period at Stanford University, California.

Sondheimer's notable students include K. C. Nicolaou and Raphael Mechoulam

Awards and honours

• In 1960, Sondheimer was awarded the Israel Prize, in exact sciences.
• In 1961, he received the Corday-Morgan medal and Prize.
• In 1967, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.

See also

• List of Israel Prize recipients

External links

• Biography on UCL website

Further reading

• Who's Who