HONORING THE 77~(TH) BIRTHDAY OF PROFESSOR EI-ICHI NEGISHI

摘要

It is both a considerable pleasure and great honor to acknowledge the many achievements of Professor Ei-ichi Negishi of Purdue University's Department of Chemistry and to participate in the celebration of his 77~(th) birthday, a special milestone in the Japanese culture. I was an undergraduate student (the first I believe) with Professor Negishi when he had just started his independent academic career at Syracuse University. I had the privilege of being introduced to synthetic organic chemistry, laboratory research and the scientific method by Professor Negishi when his fledgling lab was only constituted of a single postdoctoral fellow (Dr. Takao Yoshida) and one graduate student (George Lew). I published my first paper with Professor Negishi in the Journal of the American Chemical Society in 1974 entitled "A Stereoselective Synthesis of 1,2,3-Butatriene Derivatives via Hydroboration". It is truly astounding to have experienced the genesis and development of his spectacular career in synthetic organic chemistry and to here acknowledge his many contributions to our science that have had such a tremendous impact. Professor Negishi has risen to be one of the true giants in synthetic methodology and organometallic chemistry and this special issue of Heterocycles, honoring his 77~(th) birthday and for his being recognized as a recipient of the 2010 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, is both timely and highly appropriate.