Fund: Tom Morton Graduate Award in Chemistry Endowed Fund Department: Chemistry Dept D01054 Purpose: Graduate Student Support BACKGROUND Tom Morton enthusiastically espoused the ideals of a global citizen and scientist, embracing foreign languages and cultures, expressing concern for the environment, and demonstrating a passion for collaborative scientific research that cut across disciplines. This award will recognize students who are engaged in active research of the highest academic standards and whose work reflects these ideals. We especially welcome applications that bring chemistry together with other scientific fields, the arts, humanities, social sciences, or foreign languages. Preference will be given to applicants whose work actively collaborates with scholars of other points of view, cultures, ethnicities, nationalities, or field of study. This fellowship honors the exuberantly inquisitive spirit of Tom Morton. Tom taught Organic Chemistry to UCR students for nearly forty years, but his interest in learning burst beyond the boundaries of any single discipline. He led energetic, productive forays into various fields of science, arts, humanities, social sciences, and foreign languages. Tom Morton’s enthusiasm for learning and for deeply understanding our world overflowed into penetrating discussion and frequent collaboration with students and other scholars on his home campus and abroad. Tom Morton knew from childhood that he wanted to be a chemist, and for this reason, he did not major in Chemistry in college. He majored in Classics and Fine Arts, with a special focus on the Archaeology and Art History of Ancient Greece. He sustained throughout his life an avid interest in medieval and contemporary music, anthropology, Morris dancing, European history, Hollywood movies of the Golden Age and French movies of the 1930s. In the hard sciences, Tom was fascinated by neuroscience, biology, and physics. Forward thinking about the environment, Tom developed a “Zero-Effluent” laboratory manual in the early 1970s when upcycling and reduction of waste were practically unknown concepts. He took a Computer Programming class in 1963, when the field was brand new. In addition to his fascination with and devotion to science, Tom Morton firmly believed in the study of foreign languages, sometimes requiring his own graduate students to take French before they collaborated with a laboratory in France. He himself studied Latin, ancient Greek, French, and German. He was known for spontaneous and joyful toasts in Latin or Greek. Late in his career, Tom found a tutor to teach him the Thai alphabet. Tom toiled long and hard as a researcher. His family remembers him doing experiments that required him to run to the laboratory, adjust his apparatus, return home to sleep a bit, and then run back to the laboratory again, for days on end. Other times when he stayed late at the laboratory, it was not for research, but teaching. He was well-known for his late-night review sessions and his wish to assist others as they learned. Tom especially encouraged his students to join him in carrying out research in laboratories in France and Holland. In this way, he enabled generations of young researchers to try something new. Tom was fascinated by the universe and by the human presence in it. He was enthusiastic about "pushing back the frontiers of science". This award, we hope, can encourage new students to delve into the kind of questions that made Tom Morton laugh with excitement and work with fervor. Fund Purpose: This Fund shall be used to provide tuition support for graduate students who have declared Chemistry as an area of study. Eff: 12/31/21 - Converted from endowment intent # 6I0134 to a true endowment # 600483. Criteria and Selection Process The selection process shall be administered by the CNAS Scholarship Committee annually, and the award shall be used to provide financial support for one or more students who meets the following criteria: 1. A graduate student in Chemistry engaging in active research 2. Good academic standing with the university. 3. Evidence of academic achievement and seriousness of purpose 4. Reflects the ideals of collaboration across divisions, open-mindedness, discovery, etc. 5. Preference will be given to students whose work: a. transcends boundaries between specific fields of science and/or the social sciences, the arts, and the humanities, including foreign languages b. Involves active collaboration with other scholars of different cultures and nationalities c. would be enriched by travel to a foreign country d. would aid environmental remediation efforts In years when there is no candidate who meets the criteria, awards will be held until the following year.