Alan MacDiarmid (1927–2007)

Alan G. MacDiarmid, a key figure in inorganic chemistry, discovered conductive polymers. Born and raised in New Zealand, MacDiarmid received his higher education at the University of New Zealand, the University of Wisconsin, and Cambridge University before joining the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania in 1955. In 1975, while visiting the Tokyo Institute of Technology, MacDiarmid had a chance encounter with Hideki Shirakawa over a cup of green tea. The two discussed their mutual fascination with conductive materials, and MacDiarmid invited Shirakawa to visit the University of Pennsylvania for a year.

It was there, along with physics professor Alan J. Heeger, that they discovered “synthetic metals,” polymers that conduct electricity. MacDiarmid and his collaborators found that the conductivity of polymers increases significantly after doping, the process by which electrons are removed (through oxidation) or inserted (through reduction) into the polymer. This discovery opened a floodgate of research in conducting, semiconducting, and metallic organic polymers, which resulted in cheap and easy-to-manufacture conducting polymers whose uses include rechargeable batteries, electromagnetic interference shielding, antistatic dissipation, stealth applications, corrosion inhibition, flexible “plastic” transistors and electrodes, and electroluminescent polymer displays.

In 2000 MacDiarmid, along with Heeger and Shirakawa, received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. MacDiarmid was the recipient of many other awards and honorary degrees, both nationally and internationally, including the American Chemical Society Award in Material Chemistry. He was the author or coauthor of nearly 600 research papers and 20 patents.