AMES LABORATORY SCIENTISTS HONORED BY AMERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIETY
Edward S. Yeung and Klaus Ruedenberg receive prestigious ACS awards

 AMES, Iowa – The U.S. Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory at Iowa State University is proud to announce that two members of its scientific staff have been recognized by the American Chemical Society for their remarkable career achievements in chemistry and the noteworthy contributions they have made to their individual fields.

Edward S. Yeung, director of Ames Laboratory’s Chemical and Biological Sciences Program and an ISU Distinguished Professor, has been given the ACS Award in Chromatography. To be nominated for this award, the individual must have made an outstanding contribution to the field of chromatography, with particular consideration given to development of new methods.

Klaus Ruedenberg, an Ames Laboratory associate and an ISU Distinguished Professor Emeritus, has been given the ACS Award in Theoretical Chemistry. Nominees for this award must have accomplished innovative research in the field of theoretical chemistry that is characterized by depth, originality and scientific significance.

Yeung and Ruedenberg will be honored during a special awards ceremony at the ACS national meeting in Orlando, April 9, 2002.

The selection of Yeung to receive the ACS Award in Chromatography speaks to the enormous and impressive volume of research he has produced in the area of chemical separations. "It is significant to note that Dr. Yeung’s work has contributed to both our fundamental understanding of chromatography and to the way chromatography is being practiced today," said Michael J. Sepaniak, head of the Department of Chemistry at The University of Tennessee, Knoxville. A former student of Yeung’s, Sepaniak nominated him for the ACS award.

Among his many research accomplishments leading to the ACS Award in Chromatography, Yeung pioneered the method of multiplexed capillary electrophoresis and in 1995 incorporated the technique into a fluorescence-based DNA sequencer that dramatically reduced the time needed to gather information on an individual’s genetic makeup. Yeung recently combined the technique with absorption detection, creating a new technology that can gather data on a much wider range of compounds. His revamped technology relies on the amount of ultraviolet light molecules in a compound absorb to determine their type and quantity, and so eliminates the need to attach optical tags to those compounds that don’t fluoresce naturally.

In other work, Yeung has developed a method to track the activity of single molecules in solution, a breakthrough that ultimately may have great implications within the fields of medicine, catalysis and biotechnology. With this approach, Yeung was able to elucidate the fundamental mechanisms of chromatography with unprecedented detail.

Yeung has received many awards for his research, including the ACS Fisher Award in Analytical Chemistry in 1994 and the ACS Division of Analytical Chemistry Award in Chemical Instrumentation in 1987. In 2001, he received his fourth R&D 100 Award. He is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

The choice of Klaus Ruedenberg as recipient of the ACS Award in Theoretical Chemistry honors him as one of the few quantum chemists in the world to be recognized as a leader in establishing the field of theoretical chemistry and ensuring its viability during the last 50 years.

"Professor Ruedenberg is one of the most highly respected and accomplished theoretical chemists in the world," said Mark Gordon, director of Ames Laboratory’s Applied Mathematics and Computational Sciences Program and an ISU Distinguished Professor. Gordon, who nominated Ruedenberg for the ACS award, continued, "Klaus’ recognition arises not only because of his outstanding research accomplishments, but also as a result of his many contributions to the scientific community as an articulate and inspiring leader."

Ruedenberg’s work has been characterized by seminally advancing many different, important facets of quantum chemistry, encompassing fundamental theory, formal mathematical developments, computational methods and software implementations, as well as conceptual interpretations. Many of the methods and concepts introduced by him have become widely accepted and used.

Among his most noteworthy contributions is his elucidation of the energetic interactions that cause molecule formation. It has led to profound insights into the basic origin and the physical nature of the chemical bond.

Closely related are his unique methods for creating a rigorous quantum theoretical foundation for the two-hundred-year-old empirical model of molecules being built from atoms. His approach elucidates how atoms get modified by the interactions in a molecular environment.

Fundamental theoretical aspects regarding the understanding of chemical reactions have been illuminated by Ruedenberg’s studies of molecular potential energy surfaces. His discoveries regarding intersections of energy surfaces are relevant for photochemistry.

In recent work, Ruedenberg has been addressing the problem of electron correlation, a major bottleneck in the quest for accurate quantitative predictions of the properties, in particular energies, of ground and excited electronic states of molecules – a basic goal of theoretical chemistry. The objective of these advances is to gain reliable theoretical access to important complex systems.

Ruedenberg is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. His many honors include the Midwest Award of the American Chemical Society, membership in the International Academy of Quantum Molecular Sciences, and honorary doctorates from the following universities: Basel (Switzerland), Bielefeld (Germany) and Siegen (Germany). For many years, he was editor-in-chief of the professional journal, Theoretica Chimica Acta.

Ames Laboratory is operated for the DOE by Iowa State University. The Lab conducts research into various areas of national concern, including energy resources, high-speed computer design, environmental cleanup and restoration, and the synthesis and study of new materials.

###