Personal Info
- Country of residence: United States
Information
Omar Moanes Yaghi is a
Jordanian-American chemist, born in Amman in 1965. He is the James and Netgear
Chair Professor of Chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, and
holds the rank of No. 2 in the list of the most famous and best scientists and
engineers in the world for the period Between 1998 - 2008. He was granted Saudi
citizenship, according to a royal decree on November 11, 2021.
His biography
Yaghi was born in Amman, Jordan, in
1965, and his family was refugees there. When he reached the age of 15, he
immigrated to the United States of America at the encouragement of his father.
He proceeded to take lectures at Hudson Valley Community College, despite
having little knowledge of the English language. He later transferred to the
University of Albany to finish his studies. Then he began his master's studies
at the University of Illinois, and obtained his Ph.D. in 1990 under the
supervision of Professor Walter J. klemperer. He became a National Science
Foundation Fellow at Harvard University (1990-1992) with Professor Richard H.
He did not. He was also on the faculties of the University of Arizona (from
1992 to 1998), the University of Michigan (from 1999 to 2006), and the
University of California, Los Angeles (from 2007 to 2012).
Then, in 2012, he moved to the
University of California, Berkeley, and worked as a professor of chemistry. He
is the founding director of the Berkeley International Institute for Science.
His achievements in the design and manufacture of new materials have earned him
honorary honors from the American Chemical Society and Exxon (1998), and the
Sacconi Medal from the Italian Chemical Society (2004). Popular Science
magazine also mentioned his work on hydrogen storage, ranked him among the 10
brightest scientists and engineers in the United States for 2006, and he
received the Hydrogen Program Award from the US Department of Energy for his
outstanding contributions in the field of hydrogen storage (2007). He was
awarded the Society for Materials Research Medal for his work on the theory,
design, fabrication, and application of MOFs, and also received the Newcomb
Cleveland-Price Award from the American Association for the Advancement of
Science, for best paper published in the field of science (2007). He also
ranked second in the list of cited chemists in the world between 2000 and 2010.
In 2015, he was awarded the King Faisal International Prize in Chemistry and
the Mustafa Prize in Nanoscience and Technology. In 2016, Yaghi was awarded the
TÜBA Academy Prize in Basic and Engineering Sciences, for his establishment of
Retinal Chemistry. In 2017, Yaghi won the Memorial Spiers Award from the Royal
Society of Chemistry and the Medal of Excellence of the First Class awarded to
him by King Abdullah II, in addition to the Peeler Medal in Inorganic
Chemistry, the Kuwait Prize in Basic Sciences and the Albert Einstein
International Prize for Science, which is awarded by the World Cultural Council.
. This is in addition to a large number of other awards and honors.
the job
Professor Omar Yaghi is best known
for founding the field of reticular chemistry, a science concerned with
connecting molecular building blocks together by strong bonds to create open
frameworks that can be used in more than a hundred different applications. Omar
Yaghi is currently serving as Head of the Molecular Clarity Center at the
renowned Lawrence Berkeley Research Center and Professor in the Department of
Chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley. He had established several
laboratories in different universities and in Japan and Vietnam and cooperated
with the Qatar Environment and Energy Research Center. His research centers are
concerned with serving researchers and designing and producing groups of
lattice chemical compounds, the most famous of which are known as metal-organic
frameworks (MOFs).
education
Omar Yaghi received his Ph.D. in
chemistry in 1990 from the University of Illinois Urban-Champaign. He attended
Harvard University from 1990-1992 to pursue his studies to work with Professor
Richard Holm. He joined the faculty of Arizona State University from 1992-1998.
He transferred to the University of Michigan from 1999-2006, then to the
University of California, Los Angeles, from 2007-2012, and finally to the
University of California, Berkeley.
Achievements and Awards
awards
Professor Omar received the Solid
State Chemistry Award from the American Chemical Society and Exxon Corporation
(1998), the Italian Chemical Society's Sacconi Medal (2004), and his work in
hydrogen storage was awarded by the US Department of Energy's Hydrogen Program
(2007). He was awarded the Society for Materials Research Medal for work on the
theory, design, synthesis, and applications of MOFs, and received the Newcomb
Cleveland Award from the American Association for the Advancement of Science
for best published paper in science (2007). Yaghi has received the American
Chemical Society Prize for Materials Chemistry (2009), the International Isat
Christensen Prize (2009), the Royal Society of Chemistry Centenary Prize
(2010), as well as the China Nano Prize (2013). In 2015 he was awarded the King
Faisal International Prize in Chemistry and the Mustafa Prize in Nanoscience
and Nanotechnology. In 2016 he was awarded the TÜBA Academy Prize in Basic and
Engineering Sciences for his foundation in Retinal Chemistry. In 2017 Yaghi
received the Spiers Memorial Award from the Royal Society of Chemistry, the
Medal of Excellence of the First Class conferred by King Abdullah II, the Japan
Society for International Chemistry Coordination Award, the Pillar Medal in
Inorganic Chemistry, the Kuwait Prize in Basic Sciences, and the Albert
Einstein International Prize For science granted by the World Cultural Council.
In 2018, Yaghi was awarded the BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in
Basic Science for his pioneering in retinal chemistry, and also in 2018 he was
awarded the Wolf Prize in Chemistry where he was cited for his pioneering in
retinal chemistry across MOFs and Covalent Organic Frameworks. The World
Economic Forum in Switzerland featured his work harvesting water from desert
air using MOFs as one of the top 10 emerging technologies, and was awarded the
2018 Prince Sultan Award and the Bin Abdulaziz International Water Award. Yaghi
was also the recipient of a 2018 Eni Award in recognition of his work applying
framework chemistry to clean energy solutions including methane storage, carbon
dioxide capture and conversion and water harvesting from desert air. He has
been honored with the 2019 Grigory Aminov Prize by the Royal Swedish Academy of
Sciences for the development of retinal chemistry. In 2019, he was also awarded
the MBR Medal for Scientific Excellence from the United Arab Emirates, in
addition to the Nano Research Award. Yaghi was awarded the 2020
Wilhelm-von-Hoffmann-Denckmonzi Gold Medal of the German Chemical Society for
his contribution to retinal chemistry and for pioneering organic-metal and
covalent frameworks. Organic and molecular tissue. Yaghi has also received the
2020 Royal Society of Chemistry Award for Sustainable Water for his influential
development of harvesting water from desert air using MOFs. In 2021, Yaghi was
honored by the Belgium International Solvay Chair in Chemistry, as well as the
Ertel Lecture Prize by the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society and
the Universities of Berlin. On January 20, 2022 during the International Awards
Gala in Vietnam, it was announced that Yaghi had won the inaugural VinFuture
Award for Outstanding Achievement in Emerging Fields in recognition of his
pioneering in retinal chemistry.
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