Whole Lotta Rhodia

Crank it!

Conversations with Henry

Jack Halpern

Henry: Jack Halpern did that beautiful mechanistic work on rhodium you mentioned.

Me: Yes I know. It was pure blind luck that Chuck Casey handed me those papers by Jack--before I even knew how to read them. That guy could write. You know, I almost went to work for him.

Henry: Did you know I helped him get that job at Chicago? I knew him from Canada...back when he was at UBC in Vancouver.  He called me up in '62, asking if I could help him find a job. I said, "why don't you apply here?"
Jack said, "there's a position at Chicago?"

Me: You hired him?

Henry: No, he replaced me!  I hadn't told anyone yet but I was moving to Stanford.

That Which We Call Rhodium By Any Other Name Would Have Been As Sweet

I introduced my favorite element back here.  Known to others since 1804, I met rhodium around 1982 or so. Rhodium drew my attention as the center of a specific type of molecule, then thought to be the closest man-made thing to an enzyme. Rhodium catalysts made unnatural amino acids such as L-DOPA. What was surprising was that it didn't make d-DOPA.

Back in the late 1970's and early 1980's asymmetric catalysis was a hot new topic. The thinking was that we could imitate nature and mimic enzymes.  Those were audacious and heady times. I can still smell how sweet it was.

Rhodium and I had a thing going on once...

...stumped?

It's a coaster I made from a ceramic tile blank--painted, glazed, and kiln-fired.