Stuart Rice was a University of Chicago professor who specialized in physical chemistry, which encompasses principles of physics like energy, force and motion, and conducted research that took the field in new directions by questioning conventional wisdom.
“Stuart had a great knack for coming up with brilliant ideas out of thin air or by way of Socratic dialectic — question, response, back to more and more basic levels to find self-consistency or to a contradiction if the idea was not so brilliant,” U. of C. chemistry professor Norbert Scherer said in an email. “No ego was involved in this process, just a search for scientific ‘truth.’ As Stuart knew very well, sometimes the process itself was more important than the novelty of the idea.”
Rice, 92, died of complications of pneumonia on Dec. 22 at his longtime Hyde Park home after battling prostate cancer, said Ruth O’Brien, his wife of 27 years.
Born and raised in the Bronx, Stuart Alan Rice was interested in science from an early age, his wife said. He published his first academic paper while a student at the Bronx High School of Science. Rice received a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Brooklyn College at age 20 in 1952, and he picked up a doctorate in chemistry from Harvard in 1955.
After several years as a junior fellow at Harvard, he joined the faculty of U. of C., where he spent the rest of his career.
Rice taught students at all levels and he also mentored 107 doctoral students, who now work as professors and researchers around the globe. Among his undergraduate chemistry students were Scherer and current U. of C. President Paul Alivisatos.
“In Stuart, I encountered a person with an expansive love of the field of chemistry — a subject in which he always seemed to see things a few layers deeper than anyone else,” Alivisatos said in a statement.
In 1970, Rice received the Llewellyn John and Harriet Manchester Quantrell Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching.
Scherer, who collaborated with Rice for the past 44 years, said Rice had “one of the most astonishing careers of any scientist, period.”
Rice had unusually broad scientific interests and pushed the boundaries in pursuing research using the latest tools in experiment, theory and numerical simulations, U. of C. chemistry professor Steven Sibener said.
“When current theories were found to be inadequate, he and his group would advance new methods that were up to the task,” Sibener said. “His influence had wide impact as he sought definitive answers to important questions about molecular behavior.”
Rice also worked in both theoretical and experimental chemistry, and probed areas like the electrical secrets of liquid metals, the statistical mechanics of fluids and the structure and dynamics of molecules that cling to surfaces. His research was far from merely theoretical, as it helped lay the groundwork for practical advancements in organic solar cells, LEDs and quantum computing.
“Stuart profoundly influenced the field through the students and postdoctoral scholars who he trained,” said Aaron Dinner, deputy dean of U. of C.’s physical sciences division and a chemistry professor. “He recruited a cohort of scientists to the University of Chicago and fostered an exceptional environment in which there was a constant dialogue between theory and experiment.”
Bruce Berne, a special research scientist and emeritus professor of chemistry at Columbia University who earned his doctoral degree in chemistry from U. of C., called Rice “a great mentor” who gave graduate students like Berne “the freedom to pursue our interests and develop into independent investigators.”
“As a professor at Columbia University for the past 61 years, when dealing with professional and human issues, I have often been guided by what I imagine Stuart would do under the same circumstances,” Berne said.
Within physical chemistry, Rice broke ground in understanding what is known as “nonradiative relaxation” of molecules in excited states, Scherer said. Rice’s work in the 1970s questioned whether molecular systems and chemical reactivity could be controlled in a coherent manner using light. Working with a postdoctoral researcher, David Tannor, Rice proffered first in theory and then demonstrated experimentally what became known as the Tannor-Rice scheme of coherent control.
“To date, I think it is still the only approach to chemical reactivity that has been demonstrated by Rice and others to actually work,” Scherer said. “He also made major contributions to the study of the structure of water, molten metals and dense colloidal fluids.”
Rice co-authored more than 700 research papers, as well as one of the definitive textbooks in his field, “Physical Chemistry,” with the late U. of C. professor R. Stephen Berry and the late Stanford University professor John Ross. Rice also co-authored three other books.
In 1999, President Bill Clinton awarded Rice the National Medal of Science, in part for his work on unlocking the chemical bonds of molecules. The award cited Rice for “changing the very nature of modern physical chemistry through his research, teaching and writing, using imaginative approaches to both experiment and theory that have inspired a new generation of scientists.”
Rice was dean of the university’s physical sciences division from 1981 until 1995 and headed the university’s Institute for the Study of Metals from 1962 until 1967. He also was on the board of governors of Argonne National Laboratory near Lemont and on the board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Donald H. Levy, an emeritus chemistry professor at U. of C., said Rice “embodied the values of the University of Chicago — foremost, excellence in all things: research, teaching and administration.”
“Beyond that, there was the UChicago style,” Levy said. “Question everything, accept only evidence-based arguments, discuss anything with anybody no matter how contentious the topic. Stuart didn’t learn those values at the University of Chicago — this boy, born and raised in New York City, chose to spend his entire career in the Midwest because he was comfortable with Chicago values. In doing so, he reinforced those values for future generations.”
Rice enjoyed talking to his colleagues about their own work.
“Stuart had an effervescent personality, always interested in what was the latest new ideas that had bubbled up from others,” Sibener said. “He was also a true leader here, having helped to identify the most promising new talent, and then set out to get them hired as new faculty in our department.”
After retiring from U. of C. in 2008, Rice maintained an office at the university and continued collaborating and writing research papers. He also worked for a time as a senior scientific adviser at Argonne and as the dean and interim president at the Toyota Technological Institute at Chicago graduate school in Hyde Park.
“He worked into his 80s in scientific administrative positions, and he continued to publish papers,” Rice’s wife said. “Stuart would say he was one of the luckiest people in the world.”
Rice’s first wife, Marian, died in 1994. In addition to O’Brien, Rice is survived by a daughter, Barbara; a son, David; and two grandchildren.
A service was held.
