2008

• Avelino Corma (ITQ - UPV-CSIC, Universidad Politecnica de Valencia, Valencia, Spain; http://itq.webs.upv.es/index.asp) is the recipient of the 2008 Gabor A. Somorjai Award for Creative Research in Catalysis, sponsored by the Gabor A. and Judith K. Somorjai Endowment Fund (see: http://portal.acs.org/portal/acs/corg/content?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=PP_ARTICLEMAIN&node_id=1319&content_id=CTP_004525&use_sec=true&sec_url_var=region) and http://pubs.acs.org/isubscribe/journals/cen/86/i03/html/8603awards1.html).
  The award address will be presented before the ACS Division of Chemical Education, next April in New Orleans.
  
  
• Israel E. Wachs (G. Whitney Snyder Professor and Professor of Chemical Engineering, Lehigh University, see: http://www.che.lehigh.edu/blog/2007/01/israel_wachs.html#more) has been awarded the the 2008 George A. Olah Award in Petroleum or Hydrocarbon Chemistry, sponsored by the George A. Olah Endowment Fund (see: http://portal.acs.org/portal/acs/corg/content?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=PP_ARTICLEMAIN&node_id=1319&content_id=CTP_004526&use_sec=true&sec_url_var=region1  and http://pubs.acs.org/isubscribe/journals/cen/86/i03/html/8603awards8.html ).
  The award address will be presented before the ACS Division of Petroleum Chemistry, next April in New Orleans.
  
  
• Robert Farrauto (BASF’s Catalysis Research, Iselin, NJ, USA; http://www.engineering.manhattan.edu/chemical/faculty/farrauto2.html) is the 2008 F. G. Ciapetta Lecturer sponsored by Grace Davison Catalysts and administered by The North American Catalysis Society. The award is given in recognition of substantial contributions to one or more areas in the field of catalysis with emphasis on industrially significant catalysts and catalytic processes and the discovery of new catalytic reactions and systems of potential industrial importance.
  For more information, see: http://www.nacatsoc.org/awards_desc.asp.
  
  
• John F. Hartwig (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL, USA; http://www.scs.uiuc.edu/chem/faculty/John_Hartwig.html) will receive the 2008 Paul N. Rylander Award given by the Organic Reactions Catalysis Society for the development of a series of catalytic reactions for organic synthesis, including palladium-catalyzed aminations of haloarenes, palladium-catalyzed α-arylation of carbonyl compounds, hydroaminations of vinylarenes and dienes, iridium-catalyzed enantioselective allylations of amines and alcohols, and the terminal functionalizations of alkanes.
  Additional information is available at: http://www.orcs.org/Awards/Rylander_Winners.html.
  
  

2007

• Gerhard Ertl (Fritz-Haber Institute, Max-Planck Gesellschaft, Berlin, Germany; http://w3.rz-berlin.mpg.de/pc/PCarchive2.html) has been awarded the 2007 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work on surface chemistry.
  By the use of sophisticated surface science techniques, Gerhard Ertl opened a vast field of studies of chemical events intervening between molecules and surfaces, at the basis of many phenomena like heterogeneous catalysis processes, electrochemical steps, corrosion, chemistry of the atmosphere, etc.
  It is the first Nobel Prize of Chemistry in surface science since that one which honoured Irving Langmuir in 1932. However, Catalysis, which is one of principal the recipients of this seminal work, was already recognized by the Nobel Prizes of Paul Sabatier (1912), Fritz Haber (1918), Karl Ziegler and Giulio Natta (1963), Ernst-Otto Fischer and Geoffrey Wilkinson (1973), William S. Knowles, Ryoji Noyori and K. Barry Sharpless (2001), and Yves Chauvin, Robert H. Grubbs, Richard R. Schrock (2005). Hence, could we expect some new laureates in 2008 (or 2009)? Of course, one should not forget the very first of them, Jacobus H. van'T Hoff (1901), the founder of the chemical kinetics.
  For more information, see: http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/2007/press.html.
   
  Gerhardt Ertl will receive on November 27, the Otto Hahn Prize sponsored by the German Chemical Society (GDCh), the German Physical Society (DPG) and the City of Frankfurt. The ceremony will take place at the famous Paulskirche, and according to Ertl constitutes “the coronation of a chemist in our country”.
  For more information, see: http://www.gdch.de/oearbeit/press/2007/42.htm  and http://www.dpg-physik.de/presse/pressemit/2007/dpg-pm-2007-027.html.
  
  
  
• Tamio Hayashi (Kyoto University, Japan; http://kuchem.kyoto-u.ac.jp/orgchem/Top.html). is the winner of the Ryoji Noyori Prize 2007 for his insightful and seminal contributions to the area of catalytic asymmetric synthesis, especially carbon-carbon bond forming reactions using chiral transition metal catalysts. He was the first to succeed in palladium-catalyzed asymmetric cross-coupling, gold-catalyzed asymmetric aldol-type reaction, and rhodium-catalyzed asymmetric addition reactions (see: http://www.soc.nii.ac.jp/ssocj/award/NoyoriPrize/2007/announcement2007.html).
  For more information, see: http://www.soc.nii.ac.jp/ssocj/indexenglish.html#noyori.
  
  
•  Jean-Marie Herrmann (IRCELyon, Villeurbanne, France; http://www.ircelyon.univ-lyon1.fr/) has been awarded the "Prix Gaz de France" administered by he French Academy of Sciences. This prize is attributed to researchers from the European Community and is allotted for works contributing to the progress of knowledge likely to have in the long term an application in the industry of natural gas related to transport, storage, distribution and uses of natural gas.
  
  
• Tobin J. Marks (Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA; http://chemgroups.northwestern.edu/marks/marks.html) is the recipient of the 2008 ACS Award for Distinguished Service in the Advancement of Inorganic Chemistry sponsored by Strem Chemicals (see: http://portal.acs.org/portal/acs/corg/content?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=PP_ARTICLEMAIN&node_id=1319&content_id=CTP_004486&use_sec=true&sec_url_var=region1).
  Tobin J. Marks was also one of the recipients of the 2005 National Medal of Science, awarded on May 29, 2007 by President George W. Bush. This Medal rewards seminal works on the design, synthesis and in-depth characterization of new substances having important chemical, physical and/or biological properties.
  The Award is administered by the National Science Foundation; more information about the National Medal of Science could be found at www.nsf.gov/nsb/awards/nms/medal.htm.
  
  
  
• Bert Weckhuysen (Universiteit Utrecht, The Netherlands; http://www.anorg.chem.uu.nl/people/professors/BertWeckhuysen/index.htm) is the 2007 recipient of the DECHEMA-Preis endowed with 20.000 euro in acknowledgment of his outstanding developments in the area of the combined in situ spectroscopy and its application to industrial catalytics processes (see: http://www.dechema.de/35d_2007).
  
  
• Stacey Zones (Chevron Energy Technology Company, Richmond, CA, USA)is the recipient of the 2007 Eugene J. Houdry Award in Applied Catalysis. The award is sponsored by Süd-Chemie, Inc., and administered by the North American Catalysis Society. The Award recognizes Dr. Zones' primary focus in the area of zeolites and zeolite catalysts. Stacey Zones will give a plenary lecture and be recognized at the 2007 North American Catalysis Society meeting in Houston.
  More information on this award can be found at: http://www.nacatsoc.org/news.asp?NewsID=96.
  
  
• Alexis T. Bell (University of California at Berkeley, CA, USA; http://www.cchem.berkeley.edu/atbgrp/) has been selected for the 2007 Michel Boudart Award for the Advancement of Catalysis, for the elucidation of reaction mechanism, the development of structure property relationships, novel methods for chemical synthesis, and the development and application of theoretical methods for catalytic systems. The Award recognizes and encourages individual contributions to the elucidation of the mechanism and active sites involved in catalytic phenomena and to the development of new methods or concepts that advance the understanding and/or practice of heterogeneous catalysis. The award consists of a plaque and a prize.
  More information on this award can be found at: see: http://www.nacatsoc.org/awards_desc.asp.
  
  
• Robbie Burch (Queen's University Belfast, Belfast, N. Ireland, UK; http://www.ch.qub.ac.uk/staff/burch/index.html), has been elected "François Gault Lecturer 2007-9". The François Gault Lecturer, who is elected by the EFCATS council upon nomination by the national delegates, is expected to present about 10 lectures all over Europe in the year between the biennial EuropaCat meetings. The François Gault Lectureship is the most prestigious distinction that a catalysis scientist can receive from a European organisation. Before R. Burch, lectureships have been awarded successively to Sir John Meurig Thomas, Gerhard Ertl, Henrik Topsøe, Avelino Corma, Michel Che, and Graham Hutchings.
  
  
• Robert Davis (University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA; http://www.che.virginia.edu/davis.html) has been selected for the 2007 Paul H. Emmett Award in Fundamental Catalysis for the discovery of the fundamental features that control a wide range of important catalytic systems. The purpose of the Award is to recognize and encourage individual contributions (under the age of 45) in the field of catalysis with emphasis on discovery and understanding of catalytic phenomena, proposal of catalytic reaction mechanisms and identification of and description of catalytic sites and species.
  Further information can be found at: http://www.nacatsoc.org/awards_desc.asp.
  
  
• James Dumesic (University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA; http://jamesadumesic.che.wisc.edu/index2.htm) is the recipient of the 2007 Robert Burwell Lectureship in Catalysis, sponsored by Johnson Matthey Catalysts Company for the combination of spectroscopic and adsorption methods, the development of microkinetic analysis, and the catalytic generation of chemicals and fuels from biomass The award is given in recognition of "substantial contributions to one or more areas in the field of catalysis with emphasis on discovery and understanding of catalytic phenomena, catalytic reaction mechanisms and identification and description of catalytic sites and species". It consists of a plaque and an honorarium as well as a travel grant for visiting the 14 local clubs of the North American Catalysis Society.
  More information on this award can be found at: see: http://www.nacatsoc.org/awards_desc.asp.
  
  
• Michael Green (Sasol Technology, Sasolburg, South Africa) is the Royal Society of Chemistry's Industrial Lectureship 2007 Winner (see: http://www.rsc.org/ScienceAndTechnology/AwardsAndFunding/IndustrialLectureship/CurrentWinner.asp) for his "leadership of a multi-disciplinary industrial team requiring sound management skills and commercial awareness underpinned by his knowledge of homogeneous catalysis chemistry."
  
  
• Gabor Somorjai (University of California at Berkeley, CA, USA; http://chem.berkeley.edu/people/faculty/somorjai/somorjai.html) was selected as the ACS Priestley Medal Awardee for 2008. The Priestley Medal is the highest honour of the American Chemical Society (see: http://portal.acs.org/portal/acs/corg/content?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=PP_ARTICLEMAIN&node_id=1319&content_id=CTP_004545&use_sec=true&sec_url_var=region1). This Award, which will be presented at the spring 2008 ACS national meeting, recognises "extraordinarily creative and original contributions to surface science and catalysis." Widely recognized as one of the fathers of modern surface science, he has authored more than 1,000 scientific papers and three textbooks on surface chemistry and heterogeneous catalysis, and has mentored more than 300 Ph.D. students and postdoctoral fellows.
  
  

2006

• Steven L. Bernasek (Professor of Chemistry, Princeton University, Princeton, New-Jersey, USA; see: http://www.princeton.edu/~surfsci/index.html) will receive the Arthur A. Adamson Award for Distinguished Service in the Advancement of Surface Chemistry, sponsored by Occidental Petroleum.
  
  
• Stephen L. Buchwald (Camille Dreyfus Professor of Chemistry, MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA; see: http://web.mit.edu/chemistry/www/faculty/buchwald.html) will receive the 2006 ACS Award for Creative Work in Synthetic Organic Chemistry sponsored by Aldrich Chemical.
  
  
• Avelino Corma (Profesor Investigación C.S.I.C., Director of the Instituto de Tecnología Química de Valencia, Valencia, Spain; see: http://itq.webs.upv.es/) has been awarded the 2006 French-Spanish Prize of the French Chemical Society (see: http://www.sfc.fr/Prix/prix1.prix.htm) for his remarkable contributions to the field of nanostructured materials for catalysis and adsorption.
  
  
• Nicholas Delgass (Professor, Center of Catalysis Design, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA; see: http://catalystdesign.envision.purdue.edu/index.php?page=ndelgass) has won the 2006 Award for Excellence in Catalysis, presented by the Catalysis Society of Metropolitan New York.
  
  
• James A. Dumesic (Steenbock Professor, Wisconsin University, Madison, WI, USA; see: http://www.che.wisc.edu/JAD/index2.htm) will receive the Gabor A. Somorjai Award for Creative Research in Catalysis sponsored by the Gabor A. & Judith K. Somorjai Endowment Fund.
  
  
• Liang-Shih Fan (Distinguished University Professor and the C. John Easton Professor of Engineering, Ohio State University; see: http://www.chbmeng.ohio-state.edu/people/fan.html) will receive the E. V. Murphree Award in Industrial & Engineering Chemistry sponsored by ExxonMobil Research & Engineering and ExxonMobil Chemical.
  
  
• John F. Hartwig (Irénée DuPont Professor of Chemistry, Yale University, CT, USA; see: http://xbeams.chem.yale.edu/GradBroch/html/hartwig.htm) will receive the ACS Award in Organometallic Chemistry sponsored by the Dow Chemical Co. Foundation.
  
  
• Richard F. Heck (Willis F Harrington Professor Emeritus, University of Delaware, DE, USA; see: http://www.udel.edu/chem/heck.pdf) will receive the Herbert C. Brown Award for Creative Research in Synthetic Methods sponsored by the Purdue Borane Research Fund and the Herbert C. Brown Award Endowment.
  
  
• Surya Prakash (Professor and George A. and Judith A. Olah Nobel Laureate Chair in Hydrocarbon Chemistry, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA; see: http://chem.usc.edu/faculty/Prakash.html) will receive the George A. Olah Award in Hydrocarbon or Petroleum Chemistry sponsored by the George A. Olah Endowment, G. K., Loker Hydrocarbon Research Institute.
  
  
• Richard R. Schrock (Frederick G. Keyes Professor of Chemistry, MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA; see: http://web.mit.edu/chemistry/www/faculty/schrock.html) will receive the F. Albert Cotton Award in Synthetic Inorganic Chemistry sponsored by the F. Albert Cotton Endowment Fund.
  
  
• Organic Reactions Catalysis Society Awards at 21st ORCS Conference
  Three recipients were selected to receive awards for excellence in organic catalysis at the 21st Conference of the Organic Reactions Catalysis Society (http://www.orcs.org) sponsored by the Organic Reactions Catalysis Society(ORCS) on the week of April 2, 2006 in Orlando, Florida. The 2005 Paul N. Rylander Award went to Dr. Jean-Marie Basset, Laboratoire de Chimie Organométallique de Surface, CNRS, Lyon, France and the 2006 Paul N. Rylander Award was presented to Professor Gadi Rothenberg, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands. The 2006 Murray Raney Award, sponsored by the W. R. Grace Co., was presented to Professor Isamu Yamauchi, Osaka University, Japan.
  More information is provided at: http://www.orcs.org/Awards/Awards.html.
  
  

2005

• Yves Chauvin, Robert H. Grubbs and Richard R. Schrock. The greatest event was indeed the awarding of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry to Yves Chauvin (Institut Français du Pétrole (IFP), Rueil-Malmaison, France), Robert H. Grubbs (California Institute of Technology (Caltech), Pasadena, CA, USA) and Richard R. Schrock (Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA, USA) for "the development of the metathesis method in organic synthesis".
  It is the second time in this decade that Catalysis is rewarded by the World's highest scientific distinction. According to the Royal Swedish Academy of Science, this "change-your-partners dance… represents a great step forward for "green chemistry", reducing potentially hazardous waste through smarter production. Metathesis is an example of how important basic science has been applied for the benefit of man, society and the environment.
  Information about the Laureates can be found in
  - the press release of the Nobel Foundation (http://nobelprize.org/chemistry/laureates/2005/press.html),
  - magazines of national chemical societies like C&E News (2005, 83(41), 8), and http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/83/i41/8341chemistry.html, L'Actualité Chimique (2005, 290-291, 6-9), and http://www.lactualitechimique.org/larevue_article.php?cle=1370, Chemistry World (2005, 10, 42-44), and http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/restricted/2005/november/prize.asp, Nachrichten aus der Chemie (2005, 53, 1112-1113) and http://www.gdch.de/taetigkeiten/nch/jg2005/h11_05.htm#mag.
  - and institutional web sites : http://www.ifp.fr/IFP/en/currentevents/as.htm for Yves Chauvin, http://pr.caltech.edu/media/Press_Releases/PR12748.html for Robert H. Grubbs, and http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2005/schrock.html for Richard R. Schrock).
  Finally, the Nobel Lectures
  - Yves Chauvin: Appliquée ou fondamentale, la recherche est une question de curiosité
  - Robert H. Grubbs: Olefin Metathesis Catalysts for the Synthesis of Molecules and Materials
  - Richard R. Schrock: Multiple Metal-Carbon Bonds for Catalytic Metathesis Reactions
  could be listened in video via: http://nobelprize.org/chemistry/laureates/2005/chauvin-lecture.html, http://nobelprize.org/chemistry/laureates/2005/grubbs-lecture.html, and http://nobelprize.org/chemistry/laureates/2005/schrock-lecture.html.
  
  
• Donna G. Blackmond (Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, London, UK; see: http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/portal/page?_pageid=61,414936&_dad=portallive&_schema=PORTALLIVE) has received one of the Arthur C. Cope Scholar Awards sponsored by the Arthur C. Cope Fund. See: http://pubs.acs.org/isubscribe/journals/cen/83/i07/html/8307awards.html).
  
  
• Mark E. Davis (The Warren & Katharine Schlinger Professor of Chemical Engineering, Caltech, Pasadena, CA., USA; see: http://www.che.caltech.edu/groups/med/index.html) is the 2005 E.V. Murphree Award in Industrial & Engineering Chemistry sponsored by ExxonMobil Research & Engineering and ExxonMobil Chemical, for his work in synthesising designer cayalysts.
  
  
• D. Wayne Goodman (Robert A. Welch Chair Distinguished Professor, Texas A&M University, College Station, USA; see: http://www.chem.tamu.edu/faculty/faculty_detail.php?ID=39) will receive the 2005 Gabor A. Somorjai Award for Creative Research in Catalysis sponsored by the Gabor A. and Judith K. Somorjai Endowment Fund. (see: http://pubs.acs.org/isubscribe/journals/cen/83/i05/html/8305awards.html#Anchor-11481).
  
  
• Robert H. Grubbs (Victor and Elizabeth Atkins Professor of Chemistry, Caltech, Pasadena, USA; see: http://chemistry.caltech.edu/faculty/grubbs/index.html) is one of the three 2004-2005 recipients of the Centenary Lecture of the Royal Society of Chemistry financed by the Centenary Fund for the purpose of promoting interchange of chemists between Britain and overseas countries (from: http://www.rsc.org/lap/awards/endowed.htm#centenary).
  He also received on June 30 the University of Zurich's 2005 Karrer Medal (see: http://www.oci.unizh.ch/diversa/karrer).
  
  
• Graham Hutchings (Cardiff University, Wales, United Kingdom, see: http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/chemy/staff/hutch.html) is the 2005 recipient of the François Gault lectureship sponsored by EFCATS. The François Gault Lecturer, who is elected by the EFCATS council upon nomination by the national delegates, presents about 10 lectures all over Europe. The lectures are delivered in the year between the biennial EUROPACAT meetings. The François Gault Lectureship is the most prestigious distinction that a catalysis scientist can receive from an European organisation (more details at the following URL: http://www.efcats.org/pages/news.html#gault).
  
  
• Enrique Iglesia (UC Berkeley, USA; see: http://iglesia.cchem.berkeley.edu/) is the recipient of the 2005 George A. Olah Award in Hydrocarbon or Petroleum Chemistry sponsored by the George A. Olah Endowment. He will present his Award Address before the Division of Petroleum Chemistry of ACS (from: http://www.chemistry.org/portal/a/c/s/1/acsdisplay.html?DOC=awards%5Cawards2005.html; see also: http://www.nacatsoc.org/nl/NewsDec2004.pdf).
  
  
• Henri B. Kagan (Université Paris 11, France; see: http://www.icmo.u-psud.fr/w-kagan/home.htm) received the 2005 Bower Award & Prize for Achievement in Science for his extensive work in chirality and asymmetric synthesis (see: http://www.fi.edu/tfi/exhibits/bower/05/science.html).
  
  
• Tsutomu Katsuki (Professor, Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, Kyushu University, Japan; see: http://www.scc.kyushu-u.ac.jp/Yuhan/syn7j.html) received the Ryoji Noyori Prize 2005 sponsored by Takasago International Corporation for his contribution to advancement of ecological asymmetric synthesis. The purpose of this Prize is to recognise and encourage outstanding contributions to research in asymmetric synthetic chemistry defined in its broadest sense, without regard to age or nationality (more information at: http://wwwsoc.nii.ac.jp/ssocj/award/NoyoriPrize/2005/announcement2005.html).
  
  
• Marc J. Ledoux (CNRS/Chemical Sciences, Paris, France; see: http://www2.cnrs.fr/en/8.htm) is one of the three 2004-2005 recipients of the Centenary Lecture of the Royal Society of Chemistry financed by the Centenary Fund for the purpose of promoting interchange of chemists between Britain and overseas countries (from: http://www.rsc.org/lap/awards/endowed.htm#centenary).
  
  
• Matthew Neurock (University of Virginia, Department of Chemical Engineering, Charlottesville, VA, USA; see: http://www.che.virginia.edu/neurock.html) has been selected for the 2005 Paul H. Emmett Awardee in Fundamental Catalysis. The award consists of a plaque and a prize. This award is sponsored by the Davison Chemical Division of W.R. Grace and Company The purpose of the Award is to recognize and encourage individual contributions (under the age of 45) in the field of catalysis with emphasis on discovery and understanding of catalytic phenomena, proposal of catalytic reaction mechanisms and identification of and description of catalytic sites and species (from: http://www.nacatsoc.org/news.asp?NewsID=71).
  
  
• George A. Olah (Loker Hydrocarbon Research Institute, USC, San Francisco, USA; see: http://chem.usc.edu/faculty/Olah.html) has been awarded the 2005 Priestley Medal, the most prestigious distinction of the American Chemical Society. He was honoured at the Awards Ceremony and General Meeting on Tuesday, March 15, 2005 in San Diego, CA in conjunction with the 229th ACS National Meeting.
  
  
• Fabio H. Ribeiro (https://engineering.purdue.edu/ChE/Directory/Faculty/Ribeiro.html) has received from The Catalysis Society of Metropolitan New York its 2005 Excellence in Catalysis Award, sponsored by ExxonMobil Research & Engineering (see: http://pubs.acs.org/isubscribe/journals/cen/83/i12/html/8312awards8.html and http://www.nacatsoc.org/nl/NewsMarch2005.pdf).
  
  
• Henrik Topsøe (Haldor Topsøe Research Laboratories, Lyngby, Denmark; see : http://www.haldortopsoe.com) has received the 2005 Eugene J. Houdry Award in Applied Catalysis at the Spring 2005 North American Catalysis Society meeting in Philadelphia. The award is sponsored by Süd-Chemie, Inc., and administered by the North American Catalysis Society. The purpose of the Award is to recognize and encourage individual contributions in the field of catalysis with emphasis on the development of new and improved catalysts and processes representing outstanding advances in their useful application (from: http://www.nacatsoc.org/news.asp?NewsID=72).

  

2004

• Michel Che, (Université Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris) is the 2004 recipient of the François Gault lectureship sponsored by EFCATS. The François Gault Lecturer, who is elected by the EFCATS council upon nomination by the national delegates, presents about 10 lectures all over Europe. The lectures are delivered in the year between the biennial EUROPACAT meetings. The François Gault Lectureship is the most prestigious distinction that a catalysis scientist can receive from an European organisation (more details: http://www.efcats.org/pages/news.html#gault).
  
  
• Kenichi Honda (Tokyo Polytechnic University, Tokyo) and Akira Fujishima (University of Tokyo and Kanagawa Academy of Science and Technology) are the laureates of the 2004 Japan Prize (20th Anniversary) for Chemical Technology for the Environment (Japan) for their pioneering work on photochemical catalysis and its application for the environment (more details: http://www.japanprize.jp/e_2004_e1.htm).
  
  
• Harry B. Gray is the 2004 recipient of the Wolf Foundation Prize in Chemistry for his pioneering work in bio-inorganic chemistry, unravelling novel principles of structure and long-range electron transfer in proteins (more details: http://www.aquanet.co.il/wolf/).
  
  
• Richard C. Larock (Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa) is the recipient of the 2004 Paul N. Rylander Award for his pioneering use of palladium in organic synthesis, including the discovery of a range of new methodologies involving aryl, allylic, and vinylic palladium intermediates used to synthesise a broad range of organic compounds (more details: http://www.orcs.org/html/call_for_awards.html).
  
  
• Jean Lessard (University of Sherbrooke, Québec, Canada) is the recipient of the 2004 Murray Raney Award to for his pioneering efforts in electrocatalytic electrodes, especially for a more durable and structurally stable Raney-type electrode (more details: http://www.orcs.org/html/call_for_awards.html).
  
  
• Enrique Iglesia (UC Berkeley, USA; see: http://iglesia.cchem.berkeley.edu/) is the recipient of the 2004 Award for Excellence in Natural Gas Conversion. This prestigious is presented every three years during the International Natural Gas Conversion Symposium. He has given the award plenary lecture during the 7th Natural Gas Conversion Symposium hold in Dalian, China (June 6-10, 2004).
  

2003

• Masakazu Anpo received the 2003 Chemical Society of Japan (CSJ) Award for Creative Work on March 20th on the occasion of the CSJ 125th Anniversary celebrated at Waseda University.
  
  
• Alex T. Bell (UC Berkeley, USA) has been awarded the 2003 Robert Burwell Lectureship in Catalysis by the North American Catalysis Society (details at http://www.nacatsoc.org/news.asp).
  
  
• Avelino Corma (Technical University of Valencia, Spain) is the recipient of the 2003 Eugene J. Houdry Award in Applied Catalysis. The Award is sponsored by Süd-Chemie, Inc. (details at http://www.nacatsoc.org/news.asp).
  
  
• Robert H. Grubbs (Caltech, Pasadena, USA) received at the last ACS Meeting, New Orleans, the 2003 ACS Award in Homogeneous and Heterogeneous Catalysis sponsored by Shell Oil Fundation (details at http://www.chemistry.org/portal/Chemistry?PID=acsdisplay.html&DOC=awards\awards2003.html).
  
  
• Leo Manzer (DuPont de Nemours, Wilmington, USA) received at the last ACS Meeting, New Orleans, the 2003 E.V. Murphree Award in Industrial and Engineering Chemistry (details at http://www.chemistry.org/portal/Chemistry?PID=acsdisplay.html&DOC=awards\awards2003.html).
  
  
• Stu Soled wins Excellence in Catalysis Award from the Catalysis Society of Metropolitan New York (details at http://www.nacatsoc.org/news.asp).
  
• Giuseppe Bellussi, EniTecnologie SpA (Italy) has been awarded the Synetix-Johnson Matthey Award for Innovative Catalysis 2003 for his remarkable research activities at the interface between industrial and academic research in Catalysis (from: http://www.efcats.org/pages/news.html#synetix).
  
  
• Donna G. Blackmond (Imperial College of Science and Technology, London) is the recipient of the 2003 Paul N. Rylander Award for her kinetic analysis and modeling of catalytic and asymmetric catalytic reactions (more details: http://www.orcs.org/html/call_for_awards.html).
  
  
  

2002

• Michèle Breysse (Université Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris, France) received last November the Grand Prix of the French Academy of Science sponsored by the Institut Français du Pétrole (details at http://www.academie-sciences.fr/prix/pdf/laureats_grands_prix_2002.pdf).
  
  
• Robbie Burch (Queen's University, Belfast) has received the 2002 RSC award in heterogeneous catalysis, sponsored by Johnson Matthey. He was distinguished for his "outstandiong and sustained contribution to heterogeneous catalysis" (details at http://www.rsc.org/lap/awards/industry.htm). Robbie Burch was one of the plenary lecturers of ICC 13.