A man walks into the Friars barbershop, sits down in the chair and the barber asks, “How do you want your haircut?”
The man says, ” I would like the sideburns one high and one low, a few long hairs sticking out of the back and a few chunks on the side and top.”
The barber looks puzzled and says, “I’m not sure I can do that.”
The customer says, “Why not, you did it that way last time.”
Sir Derek H.R. BartonDied 16 Mar 1998 at age 79 (born 8 Sep 1918). Sir Derek Harold Richard Barton was an English chemist, a joint recipient (with Norwegian Odd Hassel) of the 1969 Nobel Prize for Chemistry for research that helped establish conformational analysis (the study of the 3-D geometric structure of complex molecules). In a brief paper in Experienta entitled “The Conformation of the Steroid Nucleus” (1950), Barton showed that organic molecules in general and steroid molecules in particular could be assigned a preferred conformation based on work of chemical physicists, in particular by Odd Hassel. Conformational analysis is useful in the elucidation of configuration, in the planning of organic synthesis, and in the analysis of reaction mechanisms. It is fundamental to a complete understanding of enzymatic processes. |
