Pedersen, Christian

The next chapter, by Ren Csuk and Brigitte I. Glanzer (Zdrich), constitutes an extensive treatise on the nuclear magnetic resonance (n.m.r.) spectroscopy of fluorinated monosaccharides [whose early chemistry was surveyed in Vol. 38 (1981) by Anna A. E. Penglis] the comprehensive data tabulated herein should be especially of value to those working in the fleld. It continues the coverage, in Advances, of n.m.r. spectroscopy as the key tool for characterization of carbohydrates. It complements articles on the H-n.m.r. spectroscopy of carbohydrates by Laurance D. Hall [Vols. 19 (1964) and 29 (1974)], Bruce Coxon [Vol. 27 (1972)], and Johannes F. G. Vliegenthart, Lambertus Dorland, and Herman van Halbeek [Vol. 41 (1983)], and on the C-n.m.r. spectroscopy of monosaccharides by Klaus Bock and Christian Pedersen [Vol. 41... 

By Klaus Bock, Christian Pedersen, and Henrik Pedersen... 

Christian Pedersen, Department of Organic Chemistry, The Technical University of Denmark, DK-2800 Lyngby, Denmark (193)... 

In September 2003 the carbohydrate community lost one of its outstanding scientists in the field with the sudden passing away of Christian Pedersen. 

Returning to Denmark, Christian was offered a temporary position at the University of Copenhagen, where he returned to the group of Professor K. A. Jensen and worked for two years (1954-1956). This collaboration resulted in a number of papers dealing with 5-membered heterocyclic compounds, and the study of thio acids and their derivatives resulted in five additional publications. In those years the foundation for an in-depth investigation into azoles was laid. In particular, the chemistry of 1,2,3-triazoles was to become the research profile of Christian Pedersen in subsequent years. 

In those days tenured university positions were not regularly announced, and in 1956 Christian Pedersen was without a job. An old friend from the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) went to the professor of the organic department... 

NMR spectroscopy as an analytical tool for determination of carbohydrate structures had at that time slowly burgeoned through the pioneering work by R. U. Lemieux. Of special interest for Christian Pedersen s work was the NMR spectroscopic properties of glycosyl fluorides, which resulted in several publications jointly with Laurance D. Hall. 

In 1969, Christian Pedersen defended his Doctor of Science dissertation describing these rearrangements, and in the same year he received a full professorship at the DTU. 

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