John+Charles+Polanyi

John Charles Polanyi //Group Members: Lynn Abigail Punzalan, Pauline Wong//

In 1933, the family moved to England, where John Polanyi began his education at Manchester Grammar School. As a young student, Polanyi was only mildly interested in the sciences; he was more interested in politics, poetry, and newspaper editing. However, over the years, Polanyi's interest in chemistry increased, particularly around reaction dynamics.
 * John Charles Polanyi** was born on January 23, 1929, in Berlin, Germany. He is the son of renowned Hungarian chemist, Michael Polanyi, and nephew of influential economist, Karl Polanyi.

Polanyi went on to attend the University of Manchester, where he earned his B.Sc and Ph.D. in chemistry in 1952. Later on in the year, Polanyi emigrated to Canada and worked for the National Reseach Council of Canada as a Postdoctoral Fellow and in 1954, he worked as a Research Associate at Princton University until 1956. In 1957, Polanyi was appointed as Lecturer at University of Toronto until 1957, when he became Assistant Professor and then Associate Professor in 1960, and finally, University Professor since 1974.

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Accomplishments John Charles Polanyi has had many accomplishments. He is the founding Senior Fellow of Massey College, and is a member of the Board of the Ontario Laser, Lightwave Research Centre in Canada since 1988, Board of Steacie Institute for Molecular Sciences since 1991, Science Advisory Board, Max Planck Institute for Quantum Physics in Germany, and many more. He is the current president of the Canadian Committe of Scientists and Scholars, and is the founding member of the Royal Society of Canada Committee on Scholarly Freedom. An very honourable accomplishment of Polanyi would be being made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 1974, and then being promoted to Companion of the Order of Canada in 1979. Being awarded the 1986 Noble Prize Award for Chemistry by HRH King Carl XVI Gustav of Sweden (as seen from the picture at the right) would be Polanyi's greatest achievements.

Major Contributions John charles Polanyi contributes many scientific papers to the boards that he is a part of. He published approximately one hundred articles on science policy, more specifically on the control of armaments and the impact of science on society. He has also produced a film, 'Concepts in Reaction Dynamics' in 1970 and co-edited a book titled 'The Dangers of Nuclear War' in 1979. Polanyi is currently a professor of chemistry in the University of Toronto.

Major Experiments John Charles Polanyi worked the with chemical-luminescence of molecules to explain energy relationships in chemical reactions. By doing this, he shared the honour of receving the 1986 Nobel Prize in chemistry with Yuan Tesh Lee and Dudley R. Herschbach. His work with chemical-luminescence led to the development of chemical lasers, which are laser that receive their power source from chemical reactions. Below are some examples of what chemical-luminescence looks like.

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Interesting Facts John Charles Polanyi's personality can be described as boyish, enthusiastic, helpful, and as most university professors are, busy. Polanyi loves to listen to the Ballet Music of Tchaikovsky, a Russian composer. When Polanyi is not trying to discover more chemical reactions or teaching a class, he spends his time reading literature, supporting peace activism, admiring art, and skiing.

John Charles Polanyi was acutally sent to live in Canada by his father, thinking that it would be safer to be in Canada since the Germans began bombing England at the time. Polanyi was not interested in science in his adolesence but grew to appreciate it as the years passed by. Now, he has received 30 honourary degress from universities such as Harvard University in 1982, University of Victoria in 1987, and in our very own University of British Columbia in 1990. For the whole list of John Charles Polanyi's honourary degrees, click [|here]. John Charles Polanyi has won many awards, and he also has an award in his name which is given to those who have done outstanding work in the field of Nautral Science and Engineering. The [|John C. Polanyi Award] is a $250,000 research grant. John Charles Polanyi currently resides in his home in Toronto, Ontario, with his wife, Brenda Bury, whom he married in 2004. Bury is a Toronto-based portait artist, whose work can be seen in the picture on the left. It is a portrait of her husband, Polanyi.

Bibliography: __John Charles Polanyi__. Answers.com. 19 Sept. 2008 .

__John C. Polanyi Biography__. Thompson Corporation. 2005-2006. 22 Sept. 2008 .

__John C. Polanyi__. The Nobel Foundation. 1986. 22 Sept. 2008 .

__About the Award__. NSERC. 03 March 2008. 24 Sept. 2008 .

__John Charles Polanyi__. GCS Reserch Society. 2001, 2007. 27 Sept. 2008 .

__John Polanyi__. University of Toronto. 27 Sept. 2008. 27 Sept. 2008 .