Dalton Postdoctoral Fellowship in Chemistry

Professor Dalton

DaltonLarry Dalton was born on a farm near Belpre, Ohio. He attended the Honors College of Michigan State University graduating with highest honors in 1965 with a B.S. in chemistry and mathematics. He completed a M.S. in chemistry in 1966 working with James. L. Dye.

Further studies in chemistry were pursued with Alvin Kwiram at Harvard University leading to A.M. and Ph.D. degrees in 1971. Thesis research involved the first detailed study of paramagnetic relaxation of free radicals in solid state organic materials, the first theoretical analysis and computer simulation of electron nuclear double resonance (ENDOR) spectra of randomly disordered materials, introduction and application of the new technique of ENDOR-detection of nuclear magnetic resonance (EDNMR), and theoretical & experimental studies of optical detection of magnetic resonance (ODMR).

In 1971, Larry left Harvard to join the chemistry faculty of Vanderbilt University as an Assistant Professor of Chemistry. He also joined the research staff of Varian Analytical Instrumentation Division (Palo Alto, CA) as a consultant. Working at Vanderbilt and Varian, Larry and his students spent the next five years developing various variants of Saturation Transfer Spectroscopy (STS). Larry also developed (with Vanderbilt graduate student Bruce Robinson) a general theory of magnetic resonance capable of simulating the effects of molecular dynamics for any frequency regime (from the fast motion to rigid lattice limits); this overcame the deficiencies of earlier perturbation approaches to analysis of the effects of molecular dynamics on spectra. In 1973, Larry was promoted to Associate Professor of Chemistry. In 1974, he received an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship followed by a Camille and Henry Dreyfus Teacher Scholar Award in 1975, and a National Institutes of Health Research Career Development Award (also in 1975).

In 1976, Larry joined the Chemistry faculty of the State University of New York at Stony Brook. His research focused on development of new forms of magnetic resonance instrumentation and application of the techniques to characterization of biomolecules (proteins, DNA, lipids, and their interactions) and novel species in material science. In 1981, Larry was promoted to Professor of Chemistry at Stony Brook.

In 1982, Larry joined the faculty of the University of Southern California as Professor of Chemistry. His research at USC focused on materials chemistry and particularly on organic electroactive materials for photonic and optoelectronic applications. In 1986, Larry received the Burlington Northern Foundation Faculty Achievement Award and in 1990, the University of Southern California Associates Award for Creativity in Research and Scholarship. He subsequently received the 1996 Richard C. Tolman Medal of the Southern California Section of the ACS. In 1994, Larry was appointed the first holder of the Harold E. and Lillian M. Moulton Professorship in Chemistry at USC. In 1995, Larry became Director of the Department of Defense MURI Center for Materials and Processing at the Nanometer Scale.

In 1998, Larry joined the faculty of the University of Washington. At UW, he soon became the leader of a number of multi-investigator research programs including the NSF sponsored STC on Materials and Devices for Information Technology Research. His research at the UW has focused on the theory-inspired design of improved electro-optic materials. Larry is now Professor Emeritus of Chemistry at UW.