#RIP dr. F. Sherwood Rowland [ my homage]

more about him

Cities & Global Climate Change {out 2011}

Dr. F. Sherwood Rowland is the Donald Bren Research Professor of Chemistry and Earth System Science at the University of California Irvine. He came to the University of California Irvine in 1964 as the first chair of the Department of Chemistry. He became the Donald Bren Professor of Chemistry in 1989, and was named to the Research Professor position in 1994. He earned his B.A. from Ohio Wesleyan University and his M.S. and Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. In 1995, Rowland shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Mario Molina and Paul Crutzen "for their work in atmospheric chemistry, particularly concerning the formation and decomposition of ozone."

Dr. Rowland and his postdoctoral colleague Mario Molina were the first scientists to warn in 1974 that chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) released into the atmosphere were depleting the earth's critical ozone layer. The Montreal Protocol of the United Nations Environment Program became the first international agreement for controlling and ameliorating environmental damage to the global atmosphere by calling for elimination of CFC manufacture and release. Continuing measurements of the concentration of CFC molecules in the atmosphere have shown declining concentraions as required by this protocol.

Rowland has also been investigating the impacts on the atmosphere of methane gas and other hydrocarbons. The global atmospheric concentrations of methane increased steadily during the 1980s, but have slowed down since with no significant increase in the past seven years. Methane absorbs terrestrial infrared radiation, and increases in its concentration contribute to the "greenhouse effect. The leadership of the Rowland research group is now shared with Professor Donald Blake, and the group is continuing its investigations of the hydrocarbon and halocarbon pollution of the atmosphere. Rowland has co-authored more than 400 scientific publications in the areas of atmospheric chemistry, radiochemistry, and chemical kinetics.

Rowland is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, and a foreign member of the Royal Society (U.K.). He served as Foreign Secretary of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences from 1994 to 2002.

Among other awards Rowland has received the Tyler World Prize in Ecology and Energy in 1983, the Dana Award for Pioneering Achievements in Health in 1987, and the Japan Prize in Environmental Science and Technology in 1989. During 1991-1993, he served successive one-year terms as President-Elect, President, and Chairman of the Board of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He has received honorary degrees from eighteen universities.

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