Photo: Barney Grubbs — File:Chauvin, Yves (1930-2015).jpg (Wikimedia Commons) · CC BY 2.0
Yves Chauvin
1930–2015 · France · Born 1900–1939
Nobel Chemistry 2005
French chemist who deciphered how olefin metathesis works, enabling catalysts that reshuffle double bonds in synthesis and industry.
Nobel-winning work
Fields
Related topics
Metal–carbon compounds
Organometallic compounds place a metal in direct contact with carbon. Their bonds range from highly polar M–C σ bonds to multicentre metal–ligand interactions such as η² alkene, η⁵ cyclopentadienyl and metal carbonyl coordination.
Homogeneous catalysis (Ziegler–Natta, Grubbs)
A homogeneous catalyst moves through a closed sequence of elementary steps in the same phase as the substrate. Small changes in ligands, oxidation state or vacant sites can redirect an entire cycle and change selectivity.
Atom economy, sustainable catalysis
How reaction design and catalysis can direct reactant atoms into useful product while reducing material and energy burdens.