About John Polanyi
John Charles Polanyi (Hungarian: Polányi János Károly; born 23 January 1929) is a German-born Canadian chemist. He was awarded the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his research in chemical reaction dynamics. Polanyi was born into the prominent Hungarian Polányi (Pollacsek) family in Berlin, Germany, prior to his family emigrating in 1933 to the United Kingdom where he was subsequently educated at the University of Manchester, achieving his Ph.D in 1952, and did postdoctoral research at the National Research Council in Canada (1952-1954) and Princeton University in New Jersey (1954-1956). Polanyi's first academic appointment was at the University of Toronto in 1956, and he remains there as of 2025 as University Professor Emeritus. In addition to the Nobel Prize, Polanyi has received numerous other awards, including 33 honorary degrees, the Wolf Prize in Chemistry and the Gerhard Herzberg Canada Gold Medal for Science and Engineering. Outside his scientific pursuits, Polanyi is active in public policy discussion, especially concerning science and nuclear weapons. According to György Marx, he was one of "The Martians", a group of prominent Hungarian scientists who emigrated to the United States in the first half of the 20th century. Polanyi's first academic appointment was at the University of Toronto in 1956, and he remains there as of 2025 as Professor Emeritus/Emerita. His father, Michael Polanyi, was a professor in the chemistry department during his first year of university, before transferring to a newly created position in the social studies department. He was awarded the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his research in chemical kinetics.
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