The Welch Foundation gives $5M to chemistry

The Welch Foundation gives $5M to chemistry
Grant will help attract best young faculty, graduate students

BY JADE BOYD
Rice News Staff

The Welch Foundation has awarded Rice’s Department of Chemistry a $5 million grant to bolster faculty and graduate student recruitment as the department works to fulfill its ambition of moving into the top 20 in national rankings.

“This funding will allow our department to build upon its considerable strength in nanochemistry by fostering alliances between basic chemistry, nanochemistry and fields ranging from medicine and materials to energy and the environment,” said Seiichi Matsuda, chemistry department chair.

Matsuda said the grant comes at a critical time as the department prepares to replace retiring professors who represent more than one third of its faculty.

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“The generation that entered the physical sciences in the 1950s and 60s, during the era of Sputnik and the moon race is reaching retirement age,” Matsuda said. “This is a problem facing universities nationwide, but Rice is extremely fortunate to be in Texas, where The Welch Foundation has made an enduring commitment to attracting and retaining the best and brightest minds in chemistry.”

Founded in honor of self-made Houston businessman Robert Alonzo Welch, The Welch Foundation is one of the nation’s oldest and largest private funding sources for basic chemical research. Since its founding in 1954, the foundation has contributed to the advancement of chemistry through research grants, departmental programs, endowed chairs, visiting lectureships and other special projects at educational institutions across Texas.

“Bold and astute leaders like Rick Smalley, John Margrave, Norman Hackerman, Bob Curl and Jim Kinsey have handed down a lasting legacy of leadership in our department,” Matsuda said. “The Welch Foundation’s steadfast support helped create that legacy, and its continued support will help us build upon it.”

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Matsuda said the funding also will honor two distinguished visionaries — Norman Hackerman and J. Evans Attwell — for their many years of dedicated service to both Rice and The Welch Foundation.

Matsuda said $2 million of the grant will bolster the Norman Hackerman-Welch Foundation Investigatorships in Nanoscience and Nanotechnology. That program was established in 1996 during the historic fundraising initiative that led to the building of Dell Butcher Hall and the founding of what is now the Smalley Institute for Nanoscale Science and Technology. The program honors Hackerman, a world-renowned chemist and longtime chair of The Welch Foundation’s Scientific Advisory Board, who died June 16. The Norman Hackerman-Welch Foundation Investigatorships provide generous funds that have allowed Rice to attract top-notch faculty like Cecilia Clementi and Eugene Zubarev. Matsuda said the new funding will continue to make the investigatorships among the most attractive in the country.

Another $1 million of the new funding will be used to establish the J. Evans Attwell-Welch Graduate Fellows program. The program honors J. Evans Attwell ’53, chair of The Welch Foundation Board of Directors and a former Rice trustee, who was awarded Rice’s Gold Medal for extraordinary university service in 1997.

“Vibrant, leading-edge research requires not just excellent faculty but also excellent students,” Matsuda said. “Everyone in the department is thrilled that a significant portion of this new money is earmarked for graduate students.”

The new graduate student program is designed along the lines of the successful J. Evans Attwell-Welch Postdoctoral Fellows Program, which was founded in 1998. Students recruited under the new program will be given the title of J. Evans Attwell-Welch Graduate Fellows.

The remaining $2 million of The Welch Foundation funding will be devoted to new equipment for faculty start-up packages. Matsuda said increased competition for the best junior faculty is driving up the cost of start-up packages, and the new funding will ensure that Rice remains competitive.