Folk Fae Fife

The Fife Science Festival

The University of St Andrews is at the forefront of chemical research, and several of its former graduates and lecturers have become noted for their contributions in the field of chemistry. For a link to the current research interests of staff, please click here.

Certainly, Burntisland has been a significant area in Fife for advanced scientific research and is the current location of research into nano-fibres by Dr. David Hepworth and Dr. Eric Whale who have developed “Curran” made of nano-fibres from carrots. This is a significant development, because it is a renewable substance. Traditionally, nano-fibres have been made from carbon-based substances.

Sir James Dewar, ca. 1910 in his laboratory.

· 14 April 1927 – 7 Feb 2007, University of St Andrews lecturer

MacDiarmid discovered and developed conductive polymers for which he and his collaborators Hideki Shirakawa and Alan Heeger were awarded the 2000 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. In other words, they developed plastics that could conduct electricity.

Alan Graham MacDiarmid

Japp was born in Dundee and graduated from St Andrews in 1868. Although he had studied law, he decided to pursue chemistry and earned his PhD at the University of Heidelberg. He is partially credited for the Japp-Klingemann reaction, discovered in 1887.

Francis Robert Japp

· 8 Feb 1848 – 1 Aug 1928,  University of St Andrews alumnus

Sir Walter Norman Haworth

Sir Haworth was awarded the 1937 Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for his investigations on carbohydrates and vitamin C", an interest in carbohydrates developed at St Andrews. He also produced a simple method of representing three-dimensional sugars, known as the Haworth projection.

· 19 March 1883 – 19 March 1950,  University of St Andrews lecturer

Sir James Dewar

Dewar specialized in chemistry and physics. He was the first Britain to earn a Lavoisier Medal in 1904. His principle contributions to science involved liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen, and he invented the Dewar flask, which is like a thermos, and cordite, a smokeless explosive.

· 20 Sept 1842 – 27 Mar 1923, born in Kincardine-on-Forth

· Living, Burntisland

Curran is the name brand of nano-fibres derived from carrots. Dr. Hepworth and Dr Eric Whale’s invention is pioneering and significant, since carrots are sustainable whereas carbon fibres are derived from oil.

Dr David Hepworth

· 1877-1952, University of St Andrews Alumnus, Professor & Principal

Irvine earned a BSc in 1898 and a DSc in 1903, both from St Andrews. At St Andrews he was Professor of Chemistry from 1909 to 1920 and Dean of Science from 1912 to 1920. He later became Principal of the University of St Andrews in 1921. He earned a CBE in 1921, a Kt in 1925 and a KBE in 1948. His main contributions to chemistry involved carbohydrates.

 Professor Sir James Colquhoun Irvine, FRS

Bruce specializes in materials chemistry, especially as it relates to clean energy. Internationally known for his work with lithium batteries and a new “ultra high energy density storage device”, Bruce is the Wardlaw Professor of Chemistry at St Andrews.

Professor Peter Bruce, FRS

· Living, University of St Andrews Professor, St Andrews