Professor Wiberg was a member of the Yale faculty from 1962 to 2026.
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‘True giant in organic chemistry’: Yale’s Kenneth B. Wiberg dies at 98
Kenneth B. Wiberg, a pioneering physical-organic chemist who served as professor of chemistry from 1962 to 1998, died on May 10.
Research Interests
Research
Most of Professor Wiberg’s more recent work dealt with the relationship between structure, conformation, and optical rotation. Compounds of potential interest were prepared and converted to the chiral form via chemical resolution, kinetic resolution, and related methods. The chiroptical properties were measured, and in collaboration with Prof. Vaccaro, the optical rotation was also determined in the gas phase. These experimental studies were supported by high-level ab initio calculations.
Education
B.S. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1948
Ph.D. Columbia University, 1950
Honors
- A. P. Sloan Foundation Fellow, 1958
- Guggenheim Fellow, 1961
- Member, National Academy of Sciences, 1967
- Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1968
- Fellow, American Association of Arts and Sciences 1972
- J. F. Norris Award in Physical Organic Chemistry, 1974
- Cope Scholar, 1986
- Arthur C. Cope Award, 1988
- Pauling Meda, 1992
Recent Publications
Wiberg, K. B. Relationship between Rotational Barriers and Charge Shifts,” J. Org. Chem., 2019, 84, 475.
Wiberg, K. B.; Rablen, P. R. Increase in Strain Energy during the Conversion of [4.4.4.5] Fenestrane to [4.4.4.4]Fenestrane: a Method for Estimating the Heats of Formations of Hydrocarbons and Their 142 Derivatives from ab Initio Energies. J. Org. Chem., 2020, 85, 4981-4987.476.
Labet, K. M.; Cox, J.B.; Litz, L.; Jackson, A. C.; Yruegas, S.; Wiberg, K.B.; Wood, J. L.,Total Synthesis of (=/-)-Phyallantidine: Development and Mechanistic Evaluation of Ring Expansion for Installation of Embedded Nitrogen-Oxygen Bonds. Ange. Chem. Int. Ed., 2020, 59, 9757-9766.
Wiberg, K. B,; Rablen, P. R. Re-Examination of Some Carbocations:, Structures, Energies and Charge Distributions. J. Org. Chem., 2020, 85, 11471-11479.
Wiberg, K.B. Halogen-Halogen Nonbonded Interactions. ACS Omega, 2021, 6, 15199-15204.