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Article Dans Une Revue Polymer international Année : 2023

'Visionary Polymer Research for a Better World. Professor R. G. "Dick" Jones Commemorative Issue'

Résumé

This special issue has been published to celebrate the life of Professor R. G. "Dick" Jones, who passed away on the 23 rd of December 2021. This series, by its extraordinary breadth and depth, reflects the reach of Dick Jones into many scientists' lives, in ways many of us are not even aware of. Dick was born in Nottingham (UK) and then grew up in New Zealand. At the age of 23 he returned on a long, propeller-buzzed flight to study his PhD at Leeds, entitled, 'Photosensitisation, Retardation and Inhibition of Polymerisations of Acrylonitrile by Fe(III) and Cu(II) Salts'. His supervisor was Lord Dainton and Dick revelled in some of his phrases, such as "the fountain of science". While the rest of his career was in the UK, with many visits to far-flung places around the world, of which later, he kept New Zealand close to his heart, managing regular visits over the years. His career was cemented with his appointment in 1970 to the then new University of Kent, which had been chartered only five years earlier. His winning a Professorship in 1998, and his subsequent appointment to the Head of the School Physical Sciences spoke greatly of his rigor and his exceptional management skills. These were much in demand, sadly due to restructuring which he had to carry out to save that department during a difficult period for chemistry in the UK. Looking back to that time, there were few groups in chemistry in Canterbury who had strong financing and real international clout, given its relatively short history, but his was one of them. He was extremely successful in finding Japanese NEDO funding, and this underpinned a highly creative and productive scientific period. His numerous publications were wideranging and touched on subjects such as developing electron-beam polymer-resists for microlithography, 1 understanding the appearance of an extraordinary blue colour during the Wurtz reaction, 2 the multimodal molecular weight distribution of polysilane syntheses, 3 and the first examples of conjugated amphiphilic multi-block copolymers. 4 What was astonishing in this period was the way in which he managed to work several subjects in parallel, each with complete thoroughness, and this speaks of someone who applied themselves with great seriousness, even though his general demeanour would never hint at this. He was always looking for humour, and often the research group would end up at a BBQ at his place, to enjoy good wine and the beautiful garden maintained by David Cheung his partner, his life, and rock for forty years.

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Polymères
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Dates et versions

hal-04265392 , version 1 (30-10-2023)

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Roger C. Hiorns. 'Visionary Polymer Research for a Better World. Professor R. G. "Dick" Jones Commemorative Issue'. Polymer international, 2023, 72 (10), pp.853-854. ⟨10.1002/pi.6566⟩. ⟨hal-04265392⟩
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