Each year the Department of Chemistry at Tulane University invites an outstanding inorganic chemist to present the Hans B. Jonassen Lecture. This endowed lecture series in Hans Jonassen's name was established to honor his long career at Tulane University and now serves as a memorial to his many contributions to Tulane and to inorganic chemistry. Since the inauguration of the lecture in 1990, it has attracted a group of excellent chemists, including several Nobel Laureates and a number of National Academy members.
Dr. Jonassen was a Professor of Chemistry at Tulane from 1946 until his retirement in 1989. In addition to teaching generations of students, Dr. Jonassen held three patents, served as a consultant for many international organizations, and wrote over 165 scientific articles and other publications. Active in civic affairs, he received the International Understanding Award from the YMCA of the United States during the 1984 World's Fair in New Orleans. A year later, the YMCA of Greater New Orleans named him the Humanitarian of the Year. Dr. Jonassen passed away on January 3, 1998.
2023 Jonassen Lecture Series Guest Speaker
Christopher C. Cummins, MIT
2022 John Gladysz, Texas A&M University
2021 Lecture postponed due to Covid-19 restrictions
2020 Lecture postponed due to Covid-19 restrictions
2019 Tom Rauchfuss, University of Illinois
2018 Rich Eisenberg, University of Rochester
2017 Kenneth Raymond, University of California, Berkeley
2016 Daniel Nocera, Harvard University
2015 Philip P. Power, University of California, Davis
2014 Alan Cowley, University of Texas at Austin
2013 Cliff Kubiak, University of California, San Diego
2012 Don Darensbourg & Marcetta Y. Darensbourg, Texas A&M
2011 Maurice Brookhart, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
2010 Robert G. Bergman, University of California, Berkeley
2009 Edward I. Solomon, Stanford University
2008 Frederick Hawthorne, University of California, Los Angeles
2007 Robert West, University of Wisconsin - Madison
2006 No lecture due to Hurricane Katrina
2005 Robert Grubbs - Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2005, California Institute of Technology
2004 Tobin J. Marks, Northwestern University
2002 Richard R. Schrock - Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2005, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
2001 Thomas J. Meyer, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
2000 John E. Bercaw, California Institute of Technology
2000 Stephen J. Lippard, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
1999 Jim Ibers, Northwestern University
1998 Larry Dahl, University of Wisconsin - Madison
1997 Theodore L. Brown, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
1996 Jim Collman, Stanford University
1995 Jack Halpern, University of Chicago
1994 Daryle H. Busch, University of Kansas
1993 F. Albert Cotton, Texas A&M
1992 Henry Taube - Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1983, Stanford University
1991 Harry B. Gray, California Institute of Technology
1990 Fred Basolo, Northwestern University
