Ian Fleming (chemist)

Ian Fleming (1935 – present) is an organic chemist, and an emeritus professor of the University of Cambridge. He was the first to determine the full structure of chlorophyll (in 1967)^[1] and was involved in the development of the synthesis of cyanocobalamin by Robert Burns Woodward. He has made major contributions to the use of organosilicon compounds for stereospecific syntheses; reactions which have found application in the synthesis of natural compounds. He is also a prolific author, and has written a number of textbooks, encyclopedia chapters and influential review articles.

Additional recommended knowledge

Essential Laboratory Skills Guide

Better weighing performance in 6 easy steps

How to quickly check pipettes?

Life and research

Ian Fleming was born in Staffordshire, UK and grew up in Stourbridge, Worcestershire. He received a B.A. in 1959 and a Ph.D. in 1962, both from Pembroke College, Cambridge. His post-doctoral studies were done at Harvard University with R.B. Woodward on the synthesis of vitamin B₁₂. He has made advances in the topic of stereochemistry, developing new synthetic reactions. He has also pioneered the applications of organosilicon chemistry for organic synthesis, especially for the production of chiral molecules, and synthesized the highly stable 8-cycloheptatrienylheptafulvenyl carbocation.

Prof. Fleming has an extensive list of publications, including major contributions to the chemical encyclopedia "Comprehensive Organic Chemistry", and many influential review articles. He has also authored popular undergraduate textbooks on spectroscopic methods of structure determination, organic synthesis, and applications of frontier orbital theory to problems in organic chemistry.

Awards and prizes

• 1981 Tilden lectureship of the Royal Society of Chemistry
• 1983 Prize for Organic Synthesis
• 1993 Elected a Fellow of the Royal Society

References

1. ^ Ian Fleming (1967). "Absolute Configuration and the Structure of Chlorophyll". Nature 216: 151 - 152. doi:10.1038/216151a0.