Chapter 3 - Forty years of fluorine chemistry: King's College, Newcastle (1954–57); The University of British Columbia (1958–66); Princeton University (1966–69); And the University of California at Berkeley (1969–98)

Abstract

This chapter describes the forty years career of Neil Bartlett in the field of fluorine chemistry. He graduated from the King's College, London. After graduation, he was persuaded by members of the Inorganic Chemistry research group, run by the Reader in Inorganic Chemistry, P. L. Robinson, for research in inorganic chemistry. They pointed out that there were many exciting opportunities for research in that subdepartment, including fluorine chemistry. Neil Bartlett's broad research directive from P. L. Robinson was to work on improving the preparation of SF4 and to look out for lower fluorides of sulfur. He was kept entirely occupied with the characterization of SF4, SeF4, and TeF4. In the spare time from his thesis work on the chalcogenide tetrafluorides, he attempted to settle the nature of the new platinum oxyfluoride material. His laboratory research experiences had already indicated that Pt[V] and possibly Pt[VI] were attainable, with fluorine as the oxidizer and ligand. He found generous support for research, initially, from the National Research Council of Canada and The Research Corporation. In Princeton, the National Science Foundation supported him; and since his move to Berkeley, he always enjoyed total funding from the US Department of Energy.