B.S. Loyola University, 1964
M.S. Case Institute of Technology, 1967
Ph.D. Case Western Reserve University, 1968

Peter Rabideau holds a bachelor's degree from Loyola University of Chicago and master's and doctoral degrees from Case Western Reserve University. He is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and has held national appointments with the American Chemical Society and the Council of Colleges of Arts and Sciences.

Our work has involved various aspects of the chemistry of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. The focus of our early work was the dissolving metal reduction of aromatics in liquid ammonia. Since the products of these reactions are hydroaromatics, we developed a corresponding interest in the nmr conformational analysis of cyclohexadienes and other hydroaromatic ring systems. Our work in these two areas produced significant contributions and overall summaries in both areas appeared: the metal ammonia work within a chapter in Organic Reactions, and the conformational analysis as a review in Accounts of Chemical Research and within an edited book, The Conformational Analysis of Cyclohexenes, Cyclohexadienes and Related Hydroaromatic Compounds (see below).

Following this work, our attention turned to curved surface polycyclic aromatics possessing the geodesic framework of buckminsterfullerene (C60) after a remarkable new and simple pyrolytic procedure for the synthesis of corannulene (C20) appeared in the literature. Corannulene is the smallest geodesic aromatic and it undergoes rapid bowl-to-bowl inversion. Our work produced the first locked, bowl-shaped aromatic (cyclopentacorannulene) as well as the first two semibuckminsterfullerenes (C30's). We also coined the term "Buckybowls" and were invited to publish our work in Accounts of Chemical Research with that title (see below). Since that time we have seen additional significant developments in this research including a large-scale solution phase synthesis of corannulene and novel corannulene derivatives that encapsulate buckminsterfullerene.

Selected Publications:

• A. Sygula, F. R. Fronczek, R. Sygula, P. W. Rabideau, M. M. Olmstead, "A Double Concave Hydrocarbon Buckycatcher," Journal of the American Chemical Society, 129, 3842 (2007)
• A. Sygula, P. W. Rabideau, "A Practical, Large Scale Synthesis of the Corannulene System," Journal of the American Chemical Society, 122, 6323 (2000)
• P. W. Rabideau and A. Sygula, "Buckybowls: Polynuclear Aromatic Hydrocarbons Related to the Buckminsterfullerene Surface," Accounts of Chemical Research, 29, 235 (1996)
• P. W. Rabideau, A. H. Abdourazak, H. E. Folsom, Z. Marcinow, A. Sygula and R. Sygula, "Buckybowls: Synthesis and Ab Initio Calculated Structure of the First Semibuckminsterfullerene," Journal of the American Chemical Society 116, 7891 (1994)
• A. Avalon, A. Sygula, P. C. Cheng, M. Rabinovitz, P. W. Rabideau and L. T. Scott, "Stable High-Order Molecular Sandwiches: Hydrocarbon Polyanion Pairs with Multiple Lithium Ions Inside and Out," Science 265, 1065 (1994)
• A. Houssein, A. Sygula, P. W. Rabideau, "Locking" the Bowl-Shaped Geometry of Corannulene: Cyclopentacorannulene," Journal of the American Chemical Society, 115, 3010 (1993)
• P. W. Rabideau and Z. Marcinow, "The Birch Reduction of Aromatic Compounds," in Organic Reactions, Volume 42, pp. 1-334; L. A. Paquette, Editor-in-Chief, John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1992
• The Conformational Analysis of Cyclohexenes, Cyclohexadienes and Related Hydroaromatic Compounds, P. W. Rabideau, Ed., Methods in Stereochemical Analysis, VCH Publishers, 1989
• P.W. Rabideau, "The Conformational Analysis of 1,4-Cyclohexadienes: 1,4- Dihydrobenzenes, 1,4-Dihydronaphthalenes and 9,10-Dihydroanthracenes," Accounts of Chemical Research, 11, 141 (1978)