The New England Section of the American Chemical Society (NESACS) has awarded Berkeley chemistry professor Gabor Somorjai its prestigious 2016 Richards Medal. The award will be presented to Somorjai on March 23, 2017, at Harvard University.
The award honors the memory of Theodore William Richards (1868‑1928), the first American scientist to win the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. He was recognized for his exact determinations of the atomic weights of a large number of the chemical elements. He was also the doctoral adviser to G.N. Lewis, who earned his Ph.D. under Richards in 1899.
NESACS is the largest and most influential section of the American Chemical Society with more than 7,000 members. Its geographical range extends from the SE Massachusetts region through the Greater Boston Area and includes New Hampshire.