Robert Curl

Robert Floyd Curl, Jr. (born August 23, 1933) is an emeritus professor of chemistry at Rice University. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1996 for the discovery of fullerene (with Richard Smalley, also of Rice University, and Harold Kroto of the University of Sussex).

Born in Alice, Texas, United States, Curl was the son of a Methodist Minister. He is a graduate of Thomas Jefferson High School in San Antonio, Texas. Curl received a B.A. from Rice Institute in 1954 and a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1957. Professor Curl's current research interests involve physical chemistry, developing DNA genotyping and sequencing instrumentation, and creating quantum cascade laser-based mid-infrared trace gas monitoring instrumentation. Curl often attended the German table at Hanszen College at Rice University. However, he is more known in the residential college life at Rice University for being the first master of Lovett College.