I am saddened to convey that Gabor Somorjai, a world authority on catalysis, recently passed away at the age of 90. Gabor joined UC Berkeley and Berkeley Lab in 1964, where he remained for the rest of his career. At Berkeley Lab, he served for many years as a faculty senior scientist. He was also a University Professor in UC Berkeley’s College of Chemistry.

It’s hard to overstate Gabor’s impact on science and the Berkeley Lab community. He is among the most cited chemists in the fields of surface chemistry and catalysis. His work over many decades has led to improved understandings of important surface interactions such as adhesion, lubrication, friction, and adsorption. In turn, these insights have contributed to significant advances in the pharmaceutical, agriculture, and automotive industries.

Gabor was a founder of Berkeley Lab’s surface science-based core programs, from which much of the Lab’s nanoscience and energy science portfolios grew. His groundbreaking research over nearly six decades enabled predictive, molecular-level understanding of interface dynamics and heterogeneous catalysis, helping to build unique capabilities at the Lab that continue to drive important scientific advancements today. He was instrumental in creating the Center for Advanced Materials in the early 1980s, which led to the construction of Building 66 and established the foundation for materials and chemistry programs at Berkeley Lab that are still active today. His legacy lives on throughout Berkeley Lab, from the nanotechnology capabilities at the Molecular Foundry to the innovative materials sciences research conducted across the site, reflecting his profound and lasting impact on the institution’s scientific mission.

Among his many honors, Gabor received the Enrico Fermi Presidential Award in 2023, which is one of the oldest and most prestigious science and technology honors bestowed by the U.S. government. Here’s a video on Gabor’s life and research that we produced to celebrate this award.

He also received the Wolf Foundation Prize in chemistry in 1998, the National Medal of Science in 2001, and the Priestley Medal in 2008. He educated more than 130 Ph.D. students and 250 postdoctoral fellows. He is the author of more than 1200 scientific papers in the fields of surface chemistry, heterogeneous catalysis, and solid state chemistry, and has written four textbooks. Somorjai was born in Budapest, Hungary in 1935 and received a Ph.D. in chemistry from UC Berkeley in 1960.

Please join me in honoring the legacy of Gabor Somorjai.