Author Archives: markgreen

Mark M. Green graduated from the City College of New York in 1958 and received his doctoral degree from Princeton University in 1966. This degree and a postdoctoral fellowship at Stanford University were supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). His early career, beginning at the University of Michigan, was continuously supported by the NIH for his work on the chemistry of gas phase ions with indefinable temperatures. During the 1971-1972 academic year he was a visiting professor in Spain and in Israel. In 1978 he was an Indo-American Scholar under the Fulbright Program and spent six months in India.
In 1980 Professor Green began investigations of the cooperative properties of polymers in the Herman Mark Polymer Research Institute of Brooklyn Poly. This effort has been continuously supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF), from whom he has won a Special Creativity Award in 1995. He has also been supported by the Petroleum Research Fund and the Office of Naval Research. In 1991 he won an American Cyanamid Faculty Research Award and in 1995 a Sigma Xi Distinguished Research Award. In 1990 he received a Japan-US Fellowship from the NSF and spent a sabbatical year in Osaka, Japan. He was elected as chair of the Polymer Chemistry Gordon Conference for the year 2000. He served for three years on the editorial board of the American Chemical Society journal, Macromolecules and he serves on the editorial board of Topics in Stereochemistry. He was elected as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science for “pioneering work in important new areas of polymer science.” He was elected as a Fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science for a visit to Japan in 2003 and has been elected as winner of the Society of Polymer Science of Japan award for “outstanding achievement in polymer science and technology” for 2005. He was awarded a Jacobs’ “Excellence in Teaching Award” by the Polytechnic University in 2006 (now the Polytechnic Institute of New York University) for his backwards approach to learning organic chemistry and his textbook with Harold Wittcoff entitled, “Organic Chemistry Principles and Industrial Practice.”

Science from Away: Epigenetics and “Inheritance of Acquired Characteristics.”

 
 
“What is the fate of personally acquired characteristics? Do they die with individuals or do they extend - at times at least - beyond the boundaries of the individual’s life into the life of succeeding generations?” This question appears in “The Inheritance of Acquired Characteristics,” written by Paul Kammerer of the Institute of [read more]

Science from Away: Processed Foods = Addiction = Obesity

 
            I grew up in a swirl of cigarette smoke. It killed my father at the age of 59 – two packs of unfiltered Chesterfields a day – at least that’s what the doctors say. I remember the day I came home one hot summer evening, a sixteen year old kid with a [read more]

WestView-ScienceView: Ideas Matter.

 
 
            New York City – 1980 – I had moved back from a rural area in upstate New York to subway cars covered with graffiti, moving through a graffiti covered trash filled junk pile of a city. (To this day, a wild flower on the side of a country road often appears to [read more]

WestView ScienceView: Fireworks, War, Altruism and Mark Twain

 
 
Last night my wife and I walked over to the Hudson River and joined a crowd to watch the Macy’s fireworks display. It was quite a beautiful show, and also America beating on its chest and throwing its chin up. The good will was palpable, the cops were friendly, and glances over to [read more]

Science from Away: Two equal runners, one tripped

 
 
            Look in the mirror. Looks like you – but it’s not you. It’s your mirror image. What’s the difference? Left and right are exchanged. My shirt buttons are on the right side of my shirt. His are on the left. He’s got his watch and wedding ring on his right hand. And [read more]