Tobin J. Marks
Professor
Ph.D.: Massachusetts Institute of Technology 1970

- t-marks@northwestern.edu
- Website
- 847-491-5658
- Tech M294
- Program Assistant: Elyse Bento
Affiliations
Vladimir N. Ipatieff Professor of Catalytic Chemistry and Chemical and Biological Engineering
Materials Science and Engineering
Research Statement
Among the themes of our research are synthetic organo-f-element and early-transition metal organometallic chemistry, polymer chemistry, materials chemistry, homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis, molecule-based photonic materials, superconductivity, metal-organic chemical vapor deposition, and biological aspects of transition metal chemistry.
Selected Publications
Kratish, Y.; Marks, T.J.; "Efficient Polyester Hydrogenolytic Deconstruction via Tandem Catalysis", 2021, submitted for publication.
Wang, G.; Zhuang, X.; Huang, W.; J.; Zhang, H.; Facchetti, A.; Marks, T.J.; "New Opportunities for High-Performance Source-Gated Transistors using Unconventional Materials", Adv Sci, 2021, 2101473. DOI: 10.1002/advs.202101473.
Liu, S.; Udyavara, S.; Zhang, C.; Peter, M.; Lohr, T.L.; Dravid, V.P.; Neurock, M.; Marks, T.J.; “Soft” Oxidative Coupling of Methane to Ethylene. Mechanistic Insights from Combined Experiment and Theory", PNAS, 2021, 118, e2012666118, DOI:10.1073/pnas.2012666118.
Su, N.; Ma, R.; Li, G.; Liu, T.; Feng, L-W.; Lin, C.; Chen, J.; Song, J.; Xiao, Y.; Qu, J.; Lu, X.; Sangwan, V.K.; Hersam, M.C.; Yan, H.; Facchetti, A.; Marks, T.J.; "High-Efficiency All-Polymer Solar Cells with Poly-Small-Molecule Acceptors Having π-Extended Naphthalene Units and Broad Near-IR Optical Absorption", ACS Energy Lett., 2021, 6, 728-738. DOI:10.1021/acsenergylett.1c00009.
Amsterdam, S.H.; Marks, T.J.; Hersam, M.C.; "Leveraging Molecular Properties to Tailor Mixed-Dimensional Heterostructures Beyond Energy Level Alignment", J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 2021, 12, 4543–4557. DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpclett.1c00799.
Arinaga, A.M.; Ziegelski, M.; Marks, T.J.; "Alternative Oxidants for the Oxidative Coupling of Methane", Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2021, 60, 2-16. DOI: 10.1002/anie.202012862.
Huang, L.; Wang, Z.; Chen, J.; Wang, B.; Chen, Y.; Huang, W.; Chi, L.; Marks, T.J.; Facchetti, A.; "Porous Semiconducting Polymers Enable High-Performance Electrochemical Transistors", Advan. Mater. 2021, 33, e2007041. DOI:10.1002/adma.202007041.
Kratish, Y.; Li, J.; Liu, S.; Gao, Y.; Marks, T.J.; "Catalytic Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) Hydrogenolytic Deconstruction by a Carbon-Supported Single-Site Molybdenum-dioxo Complex", Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2020, 59, 19857-19861. DOI:10.1002/anie.202007423.
Wang, B.; Thukral, A.; Xie, Z.; Liu, L.; Zhang, X.; Huang,W.; Yu, X.; Yu, C.; Marks, T.J.; Facchetti, A.; "Flexible and Stretchable Metal Oxide Nanofiber Networks for Multimodal and Monolithically Integrated Wearable Electronics", Nature Comm. 2020, 11, 2405-2416. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-16268-8.
Chen, J.; Gao, Y.; Marks, T.J.; "Early Transition Metal Catalysis for Olefin-Polar Monomer Copolymerizations", Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 2020, 59,14726-14735. DOI: 10.1002/anie.202000060.
Zhang, X.; Wang, B.; Huang, L.; Huang,W.; Zhu, W.; Wang, Z.; Chen, Y.; Facchetti, A.; Marks, T.J.; "Breath Figure-Derived Porous Semiconducting Films for Organic Electronics, Science Advances", 2020, 6, eaaz1042. DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aaz1042.
Chen, Y.; Huang, W.; Sangwan, V.K.; Wang, B.; Zeng, L.; Wang, G.; Huang, Y.; Lu, Z.; Bedzyk, M.J.; Hersam, M.C.; Marks, T.J.; Facchetti, A.; "Polymer Doping Enables Two-Dimensional Electron Gas for High-Performance Homojunction Oxide Thin-Film Transistors", Advan. Mater., 2019, 31, 1805082. DOI:10.1002/adma.201805082.
Wang, G.; Melkonyan, F.; Facchetti, A.; Marks, T.J.; "All-Polymer Solar Cells: Recent Progress, Challenges, and Perspectives", Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 2019, 58, 4129-4142. DOI: 10.1002/ange.201808976.
Gao, Y.; Chen, J.; Wang, Y.; Pickens, D.B.; Motta, A.; Wang, Q.J.; Chung, Y.-W.; Lohr, T.L.; Marks, T.J.; "Highly Branched Polyethylene Oligomers via Single-Site Polymerization in Very Nonpolar Media", Nature Catal., 2019, 2, 236-242. DOI:10.1038/s41929-018-0224-0.
Wang, B.; Huang, W.; Chi, L.; Al-Hashimi, M.; Marks, T.J.; Facchetti, A.; "High-k Gate Dielectrics for Emerging Flexible and Stretchable Electronics", Chem. Rev., 2018, 118, 5690-5754. DOI: 10.1021/acs.chemrev.8b00045.
Selected Honors/Awards
- U.S. National Medal of Science (highest scientific honor of the United States Government)
- American Chemical Society Joseph Priestley Medal (highest honor of the American Chemical Society)
- Camille and Henry Dreyfus Prize in the Chemical Sciences (the second award bestowed; first in catalysis)
- Principe de Asturias Prize for Technical and Scientific Research (the Spanish Nobel Prize)
- U.S. National Academy of Sciences Award in the Chemical Sciences
- Materials Research Society Von Hippel Award (the highest honor of the Materials Research Society)
- Harvey Prize in Science and Technology, Harvey Foundation, Israel
- Karl Ziegler Prize, Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker
- ACS Medals (8): Willard Gibbs, Linus Pauling, F. Albert Cotton, Theodore Richards, William Nichols, John Bailar, Harry Mosher, Alan McDiarmid
- ACS National Awards (6) for: Organometallic Chemistry, Inorganic Chemistry, Chemistry of Materials, Somorjai in Creative Catalysis, Cope Scholar in Organic Chemistry, Distinguished Inorganic Chemistry Service.
- Eminent Scientist Award, ACS Undergraduate Program
- American Institute of Chemists Gold Medal (highest honor of the American Institute of Chemists)
- Royal Society of Chemistry (UK), Centenary, William Frankland, Geoffrey Wilkinson, and Materials for Industry Medals/Awards
- Chinese Academy of Sciences President’s International Distinguished Scientist Award (Albert Einstein Award)
- Honorary Professor, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics
- Italian Chemical Society: Paolo Chini and Luigi Sacconi Medals
- North American Catalysis Society: Robert Burwell and Herman Pines Awards in Catalysis
- Schulich Prize, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology
- Wilhelm Manchot Prize, Technical U. of Munich
- Wang Yu Award, Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry (the Premier Organic Chemistry Institute in Asia)
Fellowships/Memberships
- U.S. National Academy of Sciences
- American Academy of Arts and Sciences
- Leopoldina, German National Academy of Natural Sciences
- U.S. National Academy of Engineering
- Foreign Member, Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei (Italian National Academy of Sciences)
- Foreign Member, European Academy of Sciences
- Foreign Member, Indian National Academy of Sciences
- U.S. National Academy of Inventors
- Fellow: ACS, Royal Society of Chemistry UK, Materials Research Society, Chemical Research Society of India
- Honorary Fellow, Israel Chemical Society
- Honorary Foreign Fellow, Chinese Chemical Society;
- Lifetime Fellow, American Institute of Chemists
Honorary Degrees, Doctor of Science Honoris Causa
Hong Kong U. of Science and Technology, 2011; U. of South Carolina, 2011; The Ohio State U. 2012; Technical U. of Munich, 2016
Other Awards
1974 Alfred P. Sloan Fellow; 1975 Camille and Henry Dreyfus TeacherScholar; 1977 DuPont Young Faculty Fellow; 1978 Innovation Recognition Award, Union Carbide Corp.; 1979 Fresenius Pure and Applied Chemistry Award; 1984 ACS Doolittle Award in Polymeric Materials Science and Engineering; 1984 Sobral Medal, Portuguese Chemical Society; 19861987 Mack Awardee and Lecturer, Ohio State U.; 1989-1990 Guggenheim Fellow; 1998 Phillips Award, U. of Pittsburgh; 2003 Evans Medal, Ohio State U.; 2005 U. of Maryland Alumni Hall of Fame; 2005 Fellow, Royal Society of Chemistry UK; 2009 Honorary Fellow, Chemical Research Society of India; 2009 Fellow, Materials Research Society; 2009 Taylor Award in Materials Research, Penn. State U.; 2010 Distinguished Affiliated Professor Award, Technical U. of Munich; 2010 Centennial Medal, U. of Oviedo (Spain); 2011 Member, Indian Academy of Sciences; 2012 Distinguished Alumni Award and Circle of Discovery, U. of Maryland;. 2013 Honorary Member, Israel Chemical Society; 2013 MacDiarmid Medal, U. of Pennsylvania; 2016 Member, U.S. National Academy of Inventors; 2016 Tannas Award in Materials Science, U. of California, Los Angeles; 2017 Johnson Award in Materials Science, Cornell University; 2018, 2020 Clarivate Analytics Citation Laureate.
Named Lectureships and Visiting Professorships
Distinguished Visiting Lecturer, U. of Texas at Austin, 1980; Presidential Lecturer, Tech. U. of Berlin, 1980; Distinguished Visiting Professor, U. of Western Ontario, 1981; Lemieux Lecturer, U. of Ottawa 1984; Reilly Lecturer, U. of Notre Dame 1984-1985; Distinguished Visiting Lecturer, U. of Hawaii 1986; Asher Visiting Lecturer, Technion, Israel 1986; SACS Lecturer, U. of South Carolina 1986; Phi Lambda Upsilon Lecturer, U. of Nebraska 1986-1987; Boomer Lecturer, U. of Alberta 1987; Merck-Frosst Lecturer, U. of British Columbia 1987; Tables Rondes Roussel-Uclaf Lecturer 1987; Kolthoff Lecturer, U. of Minnesota 1988; ESSO Lecturer, U. of Toronto 1988; Frontiers in Chemistry Lecturer, Texas A&M U.1988; Graduiertenkolleg Lecturer, Technical U./Free U. of Berlin 1989; Roberts Lecturer, Grinnell College 1990; U. Lecturer, Boston College 1990; Dow Lecturer, Michigan State U. 1990; RIKEN Frontier Research Program Visiting Scientist (Japan) 1991; Gordon Lecturer, U. of Toronto 1992; National Science Council of Taiwan Lecturer 1992; Distinguished Visiting Lecturer, U. of Florida 1992; Karcher Lecturer, U. of Oklahoma 1993; Hill Lecturer, Duke U. 1993; Purves Lecturer, McGill U. 1993; ICI Distinguished Lecturer, U. of Calgary 1993; W.R. Grace Lecturer, U. of Maryland 1994; E.F. Smith Lecturer, U. of Pennsylvania 1994; Japan Society of Organic Chemistry Lectureship 1994; Stieglitz Lecturer, U. of Chicago - Chicago ACS Section 1994; Gooch-Stephens Lecturer, Baylor U. 1995; Lind Lecturer, U. of Tennessee - Oak Ridge Nat. Lab. 1995; Fishel Lecturer, Vanderbilt U. 1995; Musher Lecturer, Hebrew U. of Jerusalem 1996; H.C. Brown Lecturer, Purdue U. 1996; Xerox of Canada Distinguished Lecturer (U. of British Columbia; Victoria U.) 1996; Kilpatrick Lecturer, Illinois Institute of Technology 1996; Siedle Lecturer, Indiana U. 1997; Seaborg Lecturer, U. of California Berkeley 1998; Closs Lecturer, U. of Chicago 1998; Abbott Lecturer, U. of North Dakota 1999; Marcus Lecturer, Washington U. 1999; Convention Intercantonale Romande Lecturer, Switzerland 1999; McElvain Lecturer, U. of Wisconsin 2000; Renowned International Visiting Scholar, Hong Kong Polytechnical U. 2001; Bigeleisen Lecturer, SUNY Stony Brook 2002; A.D. Little Lecturer, MIT 2003; Walton Lecturer, Purdue U. 2003; Milkovich Lecturer, U. of Akron 2003; H.B. Jonassen Lecturer, Tulane U. 2004; U. Pierre et Marie Curie Institut Universitaire de France Professor 2005; Alumni Distinguished Lecturer, Michigan State U. 2005; H.M. Friedman Lecturer, Rutgers U. 2005; Otto M. Smith Lecturer, Oklahoma State U. 2005; Abbott Lecturer, Montana State U. 2005; Gomberg Lecturer, U. of Michigan 2006; Jortner Lecturer, Tel Aviv U. 2006; Boulder Scientific Lecturer, Colorado State U. 2007; Davis Lecturer, U. of South Carolina 2008; Butler Lecturer, U. of Florida 2008; Whelan Lecturer, U. of Texas El Paso 2008; MacLean Lecturer, McMaster U. 2008; Crano Lecturer, U. of Akron 2008; Frontiers in Chemistry Lecturer, Wayne State U. 2009; Dawson Lecturer, U. of Kentucky 2009; Chevron-Phillips Lecturer, Virginia Tech. 2009; Director’s Distinguished Lecturer, U.S. National Science Foundation 2009; Su Lecturer, U. of Rochester 2009; First International Materials Science Lecturer, International Centre for Materials Science, 2009 (JNC Bangalore); First Semana de la Ciencia y la Innovation Plenary Lecturer, Mexico City 2009; Kilpatrick Lecturer, Illinois Institute of Technology 2010; Abelson Lecturer, Washington State U. 2010; Second Semana de la Ciencia y la Innovation Plenary Lecturer, Mexico City 2010; Jones Lecturer, Queens U. (Ontario) 2010; Schaeffer Lecturer, U. of New Mexico 2010; Distinguished Visiting Professor, Weizmann Institute of Science, 2011; Shore Lecturer, Ohio State U. 2011; G. F. Lipscomb Lecturer, U. of South Carolina 2011; Distinguished International Lecturer, Institute for Advanced Study, Hong Kong U. of Science and Technology 2011; Karcher-Barton Lecturer, U. of Oklahoma 2012; Johnson Lecturer, Stanford U. 2012; Inaugural 3MET Lecturer, U. of Kaiserslautern 2012; Bayer Lecturer, Cornell U. 2013; Bayer Lecturer, U. of Pittsburgh 2013; Rausch Lecturer, U. of Massachusetts, Amherst, 2014; Xingda Lecturer, Peking U., 2014; Frontiers in Molecular Sciences Lecturer/Professor, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 2014; Distinguished Clean Energy Lecturer, U. of Washington, 2014;King Lecturer, U. of Georgia, 2014; Texas Distinguished Faculty Lectureship, U. of Texas, Austin, 2015;Bergman Lecturer, U. of California, Berkeley, 2015; Eyring Lecturer, Arizona State U., 2015;Annual Center for Plastic Electronics Lecturer, Imperial College London, 2015. Stone Lecturer, U. of Bristol, 2015; ECS Distinguished Faculty Lecturer, U. of Texas Dallas, 2016 Science at the Cutting Edge Lecturer, Michigan State U., 2016; McElvain Academic Lecturer, U. of Wisconsin Madison, 2016; Zhang Dayu Lecturer, Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Chemical Physics, 2016; Parry Lecture, U. of Utah, 2017; Johnson Lecturer in Materials Science, Cornell U., 2017; Inaugural Sigma-Aldrich Lecturer in Materials Chemistry, U. of California Santa Barbara, 2017; Dow Lecturer, Stanford U., 2018; Arduengo Lecturer, U. of Alabama, 2018; COPE Distinguished Lecturer, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2018; Inaugural Sigma-Aldrich Lecturer in Materials Chemistry, U. California Santa Barbara, 2018; Annual Grubbs Lecturer, Gwangju Inst. Sci. and Tech., 2018; Advanced Materials Sparkling Lecture, Nanjing Inst. of Tech., 2019; Lee Memorial Lectures, University of Chicago, 2020; McGrath Memorial Lecture, International Advances in Polyolefins Symposium, 2022.
Peer-Reviewed Publications, 1664; ISI h-index = 165 on 101,628 citations; Google Scholar h-index = 185 and i10-index = 1212 on 144,810 citations
Issued US Patents, 275