American Chemical Society St. Louis Section Chair Elizabeth Bergman (at left) and Mikhail Berezin (at right), the chair of the awards committee, presented James O’Brien (center) with the Distinguished Service Award on May 22 at Glen Echo Country Club. (Photo by Leah O’Brien)
University of Missouri–St. Louis Professor James O’Brien considers chemistry to be the “central science,” one on which many other disciplines, including medicine, are built.
He’s long had a passion for sharing his knowledge of the field with others and getting new generations of scientists excited to study it.
O’Brien got involved with the American Chemical Society more than 40 years ago, beginning with his days as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, Berkeley, and later at the University of Arizona, and he made it a point to connect with the St. Louis Section soon after joining the faculty at UMSL in 1989.
“The St. Louis Section gave me an opportunity to interact with chemists in the local region when I first arrived here and provided a chance to be involved,” O’Brien said.
That involvement has taken many forms over the years, including serving as chair of the St. Louis Section in 2014 and acting as the longtime coordinator of the ACS Midwest Award – conferred annually on a scientist who has made meritorious contributions to the advancement of pure or applied chemistry, chemical education and the profession of chemistry. He has also played a leading role in organizing the St. Louis Section’s Chemistry Career Days.
For that work and more, the St. Louis Section honored O’Brien with its Distinguished Service Award, which was presented during a reception on May 22 at Glen Echo Country Club.
“I feel very honored to receive the award, which acknowledges my contributions over the years by an organization that seeks to emphasize the importance of chemistry and biochemistry locally and worldwide,” O’Brien said.
Keith Stine, chair of UMSL’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and another active member of the St. Louis Section, was glad to see O’Brien recognized.
“Jim has been one of longest serving members of the Saint Louis Section of the American Chemical Society and has made many significant contributions,” said Stine, noting his work as co-chair for the Midwest Regional meeting in 2023 and his service as the organization’s volunteer photographer, among other roles. “Jim has taken many hundreds of excellent photos at events, and all his activities for the ACS have shown great care and attention to detail.”
O’Brien has taken a great deal of pleasure organizing and being involved with ACS Chemistry Career Days in the St. Louis region since 1995. In that time, more than 2,100 high school students have participated in the events, which expose students to different degree programs in chemistry and the array of fields they might work in should they pursue their degrees.
“I particularly like working with high school students,” O’Brien said, “giving them the opportunity to see what is involved in chemistry in its many different aspects from preparative chemistry to understanding how molecules worked when probed by various types of spectroscopies.”
O’Brien has been recognized internationally for his expertise with intracavity laser absorption spectroscopy. His work explores the interaction between matter and different portions of the electromagnetic spectrum, determining details about the electronic, vibrational and rotational structure of the molecules being studied. It has applications in cryogenically cooled molecules of atmospheric interest, metal-containing transient species found in plasma discharges and inter-stellar environments, combustion chemistry, and weakly allowed overtone and spin-forbidden transitions.
O’Brien was named to the 2019 class of ACS Fellows. The program, started in 2008, honors ACS members for outstanding achievements in and contributions to science, the profession and the ACS.
