Jeremy R. Knowles

Jeremy Randall Knowles, CBE, FRS, ( born April 28, 1935 in Rugby; † 3 April 2008) was a British chemist.

Knowles was the son of the Oxford economist Kenneth Knowles. He studied at the University of Oxford ( Magdalen College, Balliol College from 1955 ) Chemistry, with a bachelor 's degree in 1959. Afterwards, he was Harmsworth Scholar at Merton College, and from 1960 to 1962 Research Lecturer at Christ Church College. In 1961 he received his doctorate there, and was then as a post- graduate student at Caltech. From 1962 he was Tutor and Fellow at Wadham College. It was at this time a visiting professor at Yale University. From 1974 he was professor of chemistry at Harvard University ( after he was Sloan Visiting Professor there in 1973 ), where he remained for the rest of his career. 1991 to 2002 he was dean of the Faculty of Arts and Science ( Faculty of Arts and Sciences ). From 1979 he was at Harvard Amory Houghton Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry.

He dealt with biochemistry and in particular with the study of enzyme function at the molecular level. Knowles has published over 250 scientific papers and had over 50 students.

He was a Fellow of the Royal Society (1977 ), the Davy Medal he received the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the National Academy of Sciences ( Foreign Associate, 1988) and the American Philosophical Society. In 1995 he received the Welch Award in Chemistry and also the Charmian Medal of the Royal Society of Chemistry (whose honorary fellow he was), the Bader Award, the Nakanishi price, the Prelog Medal, the Repligen Award and the Arthur Cope Scholar Award from the American Chemical Society. He was since 1993 Commander of the Order of the British Empire ( CBE). He was a Fellow of Balliol and Wadham honor College, Oxford and an honorary doctorate from ETH Zurich and the University of Edinburgh. In 1998 he was one of the Trustees of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

Prior to his academic career, he served as a conscript during the interruption of his studies, an officer in the Royal Air Force, where he was mainly radar observer (though he was a pilot, but slightly short-sighted ). He was married in 1960 and had three sons.