Olah, George Andrew (1927– )

Hungarian-born US chemist who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1994 for his isolation of carbocations, electrically charged fragments of hydrocarbon molecules (molecules containing only hydrogen and carbon). His work launched a new branch of organic chemistry and led to the development of new carbon-based fuels.

In the early 1960s the chemical reactions of the hydrocarbons were poorly understood. It was assumed that hydrocarbons reacted by forming unstable, short-lived intermediate compounds, but these intermediates had never been observed. In 1962 Olah discovered that these intermediates, now known as carbocations, could be created and kept stable in solutions of very strong acids, billions of times stronger than automobile battery acid. This discovery not only provided proof that the intermediates existed but also allowed chemists to study their properties.

Olah was born in Budapest and educated at the University of Budapest, Hungary, receiving his doctorate in 1949. He taught at the university until 1954, when he moved to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. In 1956, after the Soviet invasion of Hungary, he and his wife fled to Canada and then the USA, where he worked for the Dow Chemical Company. In 1965 he was appointed professor at Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio. He moved to the University of Southern California at Los Angeles in 1977, becoming director of the Loker Hydrocarbon Research Institute in 1980.