Wacker, Alexander

Robert West was bom in New Jersey and educated at Cornell University (B.A.) and Harvard University (A.M., Ph.D.). For the past 45 years he has been a faculty member in the chemistry department at the University of Wisconsin, where he is now E. G. Rochow Professor and Director of the Organosilicon Research Center. His many awards include the Frederick Stanley Kipping Award, the Wacker silicone prize, the Alexander von Humboldt Award, and the main group chemistry medal. He has published more than 600 scientific papers, mostly in the area of silicon chemistry. Major discoveries in his laboratories include the first soluble polysilanes (1978), the silicon-silicon double bond (1981), the first stable silylenes (1994), and electrically conducting organosilanes for high energy density batteries (2000). He is an airplane pilot and a mountaineer, with numerous first ascents in Canada and Alaska. 

The air present oxidizes Cu+ back to Cu +. Thus the copper(II) and palladium(II) ions effectively act as catalysts in the process, which is now the main source of ethanal and, by further oxidation, ethanoic acid. It can also be applied to other alkenes. It is named after Alexander von Wacker (1846-1922). 

Dr. Alexander Wacker (1846-1922), Wacker Chemical Company, Munich, Germany. 

Alexander Schobel studied chemistry at the Technische Universitat Miinchen. He conducted his diploma thesis on new polycarbosilanes by ring-opening metathesis polymerization under supervision of Prof. B. Rieger in 2007 at the WACKER Chair of Macromolecular Chemistry at the Technische Universitat Miinchen. Subsequently, he started his PhD degj ee in the same research group on ins i-metallocenes for the polymerization of olefins. 

The copper(I) ions spontaneously oxidize to copper(II) ions in air. The process provides a cheap source of ethanal (and, by oxidation, ethanoic acid) from the readily available ethene. It is named for Alexander von Wacker (1846-1922). 

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