Richard Schrock: ‘It’s not my catalyst, it’s nature’s’
The Nobel laureate discusses the art of woodwork and what it feels like to have a catalyst named after him
I don’t remember thinking too much about my career when I was 10 years old. As a kid growing up in Indiana, I played basketball, football, baseball. I’ve always liked to play basketball, that was one of my games because I was at one time, before I started to shrink, almost 6’4”. Nowadays, that’s a small basketball player but at the time it was a pretty good size. So I was always thinking about the next basketball game – or doing the next chemistry reaction!
I was exposed to chemistry when I was eight, through the proverbial chemistry set. I was given manuals on how to make things that might go bang. The process of changing one form of matter into another was fascinating to me. I guess I thought that I’d probably just continue to do that, because it’s fun.
About two or three years ago, I decided that I would get back in the lab, get back in the glove box and get some results. My group was concerned about me in many ways, because I was obviously too old to do chemistry. Maybe I would blow myself up or something. Maybe I would make a mess and dirty too much glassware. I can still do lab work, but I have other things consuming my time so it’s not a very efficient way to go. That summer I really grew to appreciate how slow chemistry can be on a day-to-day basis. In the end, not much came out of my experiments, frankly.