Edward I. Solomon

Edward I. Solomon (born 1946) is the Monroe E. Spaght Professor of Chemistry at Stanford University. He is an elected member of the United States National Academy of Sciences, a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has been profiled in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. He has been a longtime collaborator with many scientists, including his colleague at Stanford University Keith Hodgson for the study of metalloenzyme active sites by x-ray spectroscopy, along with the synthetic chemists Richard H. Holm, Stephen J. Lippard, Lawrence Que Jr. and Kenneth D. Karlin.

Early life and education Solomon grew up in North Miami Beach, Florida. In his junior year of high school, he became involved in a local program that allowed exceptional students to work with university professors. Solomon conducted research with a professor at the University of Miami, using biochemistry and chromatography to study indoles, which led to him becoming Florida's first-ever finalist for the Westinghouse Science Talent Search in 1964.

He then studied chemistry at Renesselaer Polytechnic Institute, graduating with a B.S. degree in 1968. During his undergraduate, he worked with Prof. Sam Wait and Prof. Henry Hollinger in theoretical chemistry. Shortly after Solomon received his Ph.D. in chemistry in 1972, his advisor McClure went on sabbatical and asked Solomon to stay and help oversee his research group. At this time, McClure and Prof. Thomas G. Spiro hosted a symposium that hosted many leaders in physical inorganic chemistry. It was at this symposium that Solomon decided he wanted to work with Prof. Harry B. Gray during his post-doctoral studies.

Solomon spent a year in Copenhagen, Denmark at the Hans Christian Ørsted Institute to work as a postdoctoral fellow under Prof. Carl J. Ballhausen. He then moved to Caltech with to do postdoctoral research with Prof. Harry B. Gray from 1974 to 1975. as well as non-heme iron enzymes such as (4-hydroxy)mandelate synthase and (4-hydroxyphenyl)pyruvate dioxygenase. He is an expert in magnetic circular dichroism spectroscopy. Demonstration that a trinuclear copper active site exists in the laccase enzyme Demonstration of the entatic state of the blue copper protein Development of Variable Temperature, Variable Field (VTVH) magnetic circular dichroism (MCD) spectroscopy to study non-heme iron enzyme active sites Development of metal L-edge, ligand K-edge x-ray absorption spectroscopy and resonant inelastic x-ray scattering to investigate metal-ligand covalency.

Awards

Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellow, 1976–79 Dupont and General Electric Young Faculty Awards, 1979–80 JSPS Fellow (1995, 2002, 2009) NIH MERIT Award (1995 & 2002) Remsen Award (1994) Wheland Medal, University of Chicago (2000) Frontiers in Biological Chemistry Award, Max-Planck Institute (2001) Bailar Medal, University of Illinois (2007) Thomas Chemistry Scholar (2007) Ira Remsen Award Kosolapoff Award

Dean's Award for Distinguished Teaching, Stanford University (1990) Fred Basolo Medal for Outstanding Research in Inorganic Chemistry, Northwestern University (2018)

Associate editor, Inorganic Chemistry Editorial Advisory Board Member for 14 journals McElvain (1983), World Bank (1984), O. K. Rice (1984), Reilly (1986), Frontiers (1990), 1st Seaborg (1990), Frontiers in Chemistry (1991), ACS (1992), National Science Council (1993), Xerox (1994), Leermakers (1994), Amoco (1995), Kahn (1996), Golden Jubilee (1996), Karcher (1997), FMC (1998), Colloquium 3eme Cycle (1998), A.D. Little (1998), Aldrich (2001), Hill Memorial (2003), Cady (2003), Kieler Woche (2003), Crawford (2004), Walton (2005), Endicott/Rorabacker Frontier (2006), Dawson (2007), Frontiers (2007), Procter & Gamble (2008), Andreas Albrecht (2009), Hans B. Jonassen (2009), Harteck (2009), Sunney Chan (2009) Faraday (2010), Vaughan (2011), Hans Freeman (2012), Ross (2013), Ibers (2024) Lectures

Professional memberships

Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (1981) Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1998) Member of the National Academy of Sciences (2005) Fellow of the American Chemical Society (2009)