Yorke Rhodes
Broad Experience, A Record of Achievement
Broad Experience, A Record of Achievement
Yorke Rhodes graduated from the University of Delaware with the B.S. in 1957
as the Senior of the Year with first research in Soil Chemistry involving
chromatography of amino acids and carbohydrates. He received the M.S. in
Chemistry with William A. Mosher and Darryl Lynch. His M.S. thesis detailed the
first ion exchange chromatography separation of all naturally occurring amino
acids on only one column and employed pressure and gradient HCl-
concentration elution, which Beckmann-Spinco later developed into an
automatic analyzer. At the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana he
completed the PhD Dissertation with Prof. James C. Martin entitled “The
Mechanism of the Reaction of Cycloheptatriene with Sulfur Dioxide" and was
where he learned to apply practical “shirt-sleeve” Physical Organic Chemistry
as an NIH Predoctoral Fellow. Rhodes then went to Yale University as
Postdoctoral NIH Fellow with Ken Wiberg and learned more small-ring
mechanistic chemistry and began to learn theoretical organic chemistry.
In 1965 he joined the faculty of New York University at the University Heights
campus and developed research areas in liquid SO2 solvent chemistry
(properties of salts and salt effects on reaction rates in liquid SO2)
electrocyclic reactions, small ring chemistry and carbocations, especially
neighboring group-assisted rearrangements, and established conditions for
cyclopropane migratory aptitude studies. He moved to the Washington Square
campus after a sabbatical leave with Horst Prinzbach at the Universitat Freiburg
in West Germany. Work at the Square continued in carbocations and in
neopentyl rearrangements and lead to alkyl migratory aptitude studies,
especially in neopentyl and pinacolyl, alkylated-cyclopropane pentacoordinate
carbocation intermediates, and to synthetic studies in silyl ketene acetal
chemistry for general syntheses of substituted quarternary neopentyl systems.
Theoretical chemistry studies of carbocations proceeded apace, and lead to
Astrochemistry, studies of the stability and modes of formation of
astromolecules, molecules in planetary atmospheres and in interstellar clouds.
Prof. Rhodes has been a Visiting Professor in Organic Chemistry in Freiburg
with Horst Prinzbach (1972 – 1973), and was Gastprofessor with Ivar Ugi and
Dieter Lenoir at the Technische Universitat Munchen in 1977, and returned for
a second stay at Munich as Alexander von Humboldt U. S. Senior Scientist
Awardee in 1978. Other honors include a US State Department Exchange Visit
to Prague, Czechoslovakia (with Rudolph Zahradnik) and to Zagreb, Yugoslavia
(with Dionis Sunko) in 1977. He was also a NASA/IEEE Summer Faculty
Fellow with Wes Huntress at the Jet Propulsion Laboratories at Cal Tech in
1980 and again in 1981 (Astrochemistry). In summer 1987 he was Visiting
Professeur at the Centre d’Astrophysique, Universite de Grenoble, France with
Alain Omont. He was visiting Professor at Harvard University in Fall 2001, with
his former undergraduate scholar, Eric Jacobsen, and also visiting Professor at
Hunter College, CUNY in Spring 2001.
He has been mentor to 16 PhD Fellows, 48 Undergraduate Scholars and
several postdoctoral Fellows. A High School scholar in 1996 was a
Westinghouse semi-finalist who became a n expert on Fullerenes at age 17.
Since then 12 ACS/SEED scholars have been participants in his research
program. A High School Teacher Dr. Greg Fisher, became a Partner-In-
Science (Research Corp., Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation) research
partner in 1998 and 1999. Rhodes was Director of the Partners-In-Science
Program at NYU sponsored by Dreyfus and Lucent Technologies from 1996 -
2004. Two sons are also chemists: Chris is Senior Chemist with Amylin in San
Diego and Tim is chemist at Nerck.
Rhodes has twice been awarded the Golden Dozen Award for Teaching
Excellence in the NYU College of Arts and Science (1991 and 1996) and was
selected by Chemistry Major students as the First Annual Best Professor Award
in Chemistry in 1993 and again in 2000. He received the NYU Great Teacher
Award and Stipend from NYU Alumni in 2000. He was Director and co-Founder
of the joint Dual Degree BS/BE Program in Engineering and Science at New
York University and Stevens Institute of Technology from 1987 to 2000 and co-
creator of 19 curricula in Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Mathematics
and Physics majors at NYU combined with a second major in one of Chemical,
Civil, Computer, Environmental, Materials, and Mechanical Engineering
Sciences, and Engineering Physics at Stevens.
He resided in the University’s Brittany Residence Hall as “Professor-In-
Residence or House Master” from 1981 – 2000. At his official retirement from
NYU the Brittany Hall student residents renamed their Study/Meeting/Party Hall
“The Rhodes Room” in his honor. He has been active in the New York
Academy of Sciences and the New York Section of the American Chemical
Society serving on many committees in both organizations and also served as
Chair of each. He served six years on the National ACS Local Section Activity
Committee, and lead LSAC as Chair 2002 - 2004. Hobbies are grand opera
and progressive jazz, travel – especially by rail, and gourmet dining.
as the Senior of the Year with first research in Soil Chemistry involving
chromatography of amino acids and carbohydrates. He received the M.S. in
Chemistry with William A. Mosher and Darryl Lynch. His M.S. thesis detailed the
first ion exchange chromatography separation of all naturally occurring amino
acids on only one column and employed pressure and gradient HCl-
concentration elution, which Beckmann-Spinco later developed into an
automatic analyzer. At the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana he
completed the PhD Dissertation with Prof. James C. Martin entitled “The
Mechanism of the Reaction of Cycloheptatriene with Sulfur Dioxide" and was
where he learned to apply practical “shirt-sleeve” Physical Organic Chemistry
as an NIH Predoctoral Fellow. Rhodes then went to Yale University as
Postdoctoral NIH Fellow with Ken Wiberg and learned more small-ring
mechanistic chemistry and began to learn theoretical organic chemistry.
In 1965 he joined the faculty of New York University at the University Heights
campus and developed research areas in liquid SO2 solvent chemistry
(properties of salts and salt effects on reaction rates in liquid SO2)
electrocyclic reactions, small ring chemistry and carbocations, especially
neighboring group-assisted rearrangements, and established conditions for
cyclopropane migratory aptitude studies. He moved to the Washington Square
campus after a sabbatical leave with Horst Prinzbach at the Universitat Freiburg
in West Germany. Work at the Square continued in carbocations and in
neopentyl rearrangements and lead to alkyl migratory aptitude studies,
especially in neopentyl and pinacolyl, alkylated-cyclopropane pentacoordinate
carbocation intermediates, and to synthetic studies in silyl ketene acetal
chemistry for general syntheses of substituted quarternary neopentyl systems.
Theoretical chemistry studies of carbocations proceeded apace, and lead to
Astrochemistry, studies of the stability and modes of formation of
astromolecules, molecules in planetary atmospheres and in interstellar clouds.
Prof. Rhodes has been a Visiting Professor in Organic Chemistry in Freiburg
with Horst Prinzbach (1972 – 1973), and was Gastprofessor with Ivar Ugi and
Dieter Lenoir at the Technische Universitat Munchen in 1977, and returned for
a second stay at Munich as Alexander von Humboldt U. S. Senior Scientist
Awardee in 1978. Other honors include a US State Department Exchange Visit
to Prague, Czechoslovakia (with Rudolph Zahradnik) and to Zagreb, Yugoslavia
(with Dionis Sunko) in 1977. He was also a NASA/IEEE Summer Faculty
Fellow with Wes Huntress at the Jet Propulsion Laboratories at Cal Tech in
1980 and again in 1981 (Astrochemistry). In summer 1987 he was Visiting
Professeur at the Centre d’Astrophysique, Universite de Grenoble, France with
Alain Omont. He was visiting Professor at Harvard University in Fall 2001, with
his former undergraduate scholar, Eric Jacobsen, and also visiting Professor at
Hunter College, CUNY in Spring 2001.
He has been mentor to 16 PhD Fellows, 48 Undergraduate Scholars and
several postdoctoral Fellows. A High School scholar in 1996 was a
Westinghouse semi-finalist who became a n expert on Fullerenes at age 17.
Since then 12 ACS/SEED scholars have been participants in his research
program. A High School Teacher Dr. Greg Fisher, became a Partner-In-
Science (Research Corp., Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation) research
partner in 1998 and 1999. Rhodes was Director of the Partners-In-Science
Program at NYU sponsored by Dreyfus and Lucent Technologies from 1996 -
2004. Two sons are also chemists: Chris is Senior Chemist with Amylin in San
Diego and Tim is chemist at Nerck.
Rhodes has twice been awarded the Golden Dozen Award for Teaching
Excellence in the NYU College of Arts and Science (1991 and 1996) and was
selected by Chemistry Major students as the First Annual Best Professor Award
in Chemistry in 1993 and again in 2000. He received the NYU Great Teacher
Award and Stipend from NYU Alumni in 2000. He was Director and co-Founder
of the joint Dual Degree BS/BE Program in Engineering and Science at New
York University and Stevens Institute of Technology from 1987 to 2000 and co-
creator of 19 curricula in Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Mathematics
and Physics majors at NYU combined with a second major in one of Chemical,
Civil, Computer, Environmental, Materials, and Mechanical Engineering
Sciences, and Engineering Physics at Stevens.
He resided in the University’s Brittany Residence Hall as “Professor-In-
Residence or House Master” from 1981 – 2000. At his official retirement from
NYU the Brittany Hall student residents renamed their Study/Meeting/Party Hall
“The Rhodes Room” in his honor. He has been active in the New York
Academy of Sciences and the New York Section of the American Chemical
Society serving on many committees in both organizations and also served as
Chair of each. He served six years on the National ACS Local Section Activity
Committee, and lead LSAC as Chair 2002 - 2004. Hobbies are grand opera
and progressive jazz, travel – especially by rail, and gourmet dining.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
