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Heteroatom ChemistryVolume 9, Number 4, 1998

A Tribute to Professor Heinrich Noth on theOccasion of His Seventieth Birthday

The teacher/pupil sequence Alfred Stock, EgonWiberg, and Heinrich Noth marks a great traditionin main-group chemistry. Noth’s first three articles(published in 1953 together with Wiberg) alreadydealt with a large variety of “heteroatoms”: Mg, Ca,Sr, Ba, B, Al, N, P, and As. In the 43 years that havepassed since then, Noth has added many more ele-

ments to his list of active interest, and, in this timehe wrote more than 600 articles, each of which con-tributed to our understanding of heteroatom chem-istry. Our journal therefore takes great pleasure indedicating this issue to him on the occasion of hisseventieth birthday.

On June 20th, 1928 in Munich, a son was bornto the Chamber Virtuoso Hans Noth and his wife Eu-genie. They chose Heinrich for his first name. Thetime the boy went to secondary school was also thetime of World War II. From 1949 on, he studiedchemistry at the University of Munich. With a thesison “Hydrides of Group III Elements,” he received thePh.D. degree in 1954. Before that, at the age of 23,he had married Erika. In the meantime, the two havebeen blessed with two daughters and sevengrandchildren.

In 1956, Heinrich Noth was Research Officer atthe ICI heavy chemical division at Billingham, Eng-land, and dealt with calcium hydride and calciumcyanamide. After returning to the Ludwig-Maximi-lians-Universitat, Munich, he became Associate Pro-fessor in 1965 and he was appointed Full Professorat the Philipps-Universitat, Marburg, in 1966. Threeyears later, he was called upon to take the formerChair of Egon Wiberg in Munich.

Areas of his research were and still are hydridesand the chemistry of hydrogen compounds; nitrogencompounds of lithium, beryllium, boron, aluminum,phosphorus, and arsenic; low-coordinated boronand aluminum compounds, heterocycles, and cagesof main-group elements; coordination compoundswith metal-boron linkages; heterocyclic p-com-plexes; reaction mechanisms by isotopic labeling;IR-laser–induced reactions; multinuclear magneticresonance investigations; and X-ray structureanalysis.

Some of these investigations have their rootsway back in Noth’s early work. By his insistent in-terest, they meanwhile have reached an astonishingq 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. CCC 1042-7163/98/040355-02

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high state. Boron hydride and tetrahydroboratechemistry, their use in redox and hydroboration re-actions, and the structural elucidation of the varioussystems provide good examples of this.

Another important and long-lasting topic inNoth’s research activities constitutes the boron–ni-trogen compounds and their bonding, with the spe-cial emphasis of unsaturated systems. Amino groupsproved efficient to stabilize boron–phosphorus, bo-ron–arsenic, boron–antimony, boron–silicon, bo-ron–tin, and boron–boron as well as boron–transi-tion metal bonds. Along with low-coordinated BNcompounds also came low-coordinated BC and BPcompounds.

Rings and cages always exerted their special fas-cination on him. Borazine chemistry suggested it-self, and Noth succeeded in gaining a good insightinto the mechanism of its ligand exchange propen-sity. The first new system he contributed was a di-oxadiborinane. Many other boron heterocyclesfollowed: azadiborirines and diazaborirines; tri-azadiborolidines and diazatriborolidines, some ofwhich are and some are not 2p- and 6p-electron sys-tems; tetrazadiborinanes, which gave blue radicalcations; and, as an example of a condensed system,a BN phenalene. A further highlight is the first hom-ocyclic system of boron, the dimethylamino-substi-tuted cyclohexaborane. It also stands as an examplefor many more polyboranes from his kitchen.

The extension of the BN heterocycles to thehigher homologs led, on the one hand, to the boron–

phosophorus rings with their unusual features and,on the other hand, to aluminum–nitrogen and gal-lium–nitrogen cages of cubane and adamantanestructure. Another group of adamantanes had orig-inated earlier from the combinations phosphorus–nitrogen and arsenic–nitrogen.

Recent and remarkable results from X-ray anal-ysis (which he often performs himself) concern thestructure of lithium compounds: amides and hydra-zides and also—as indicated earlier—hydroborates.

As much as Noth is dedicated to research, he isalso at least as much dedicated to teaching chemis-try. Besides that, he has kept and still keeps an in-credible number of positions, all for the benefit ofscience. To the many positions listed in the Editorialof Number 6, Volume 8, of this journal, recently avery distinguished one has been added: He is nowpresident of the Bavarian Academy of Science.

Naturally, Noth has received many awards, na-tional and international, has obtained lectureships,and has been elected member and honorary memberof scientific societies. He has become Doctor honoriscausa of the Universities of Marburg and Leeds.

On the occasion of his birthday and on behalf ofmain-group chemists worldwide and, moreover, thegreater scientific community, we wish Heinz Nothmany happy returns of the day.

Alfred SchmidpeterWilliam E. McEwenShigeru Oae