2007 Professor John Simons FRS for his many innovative experimental contributions to a broad area of chemical physics, including molecular reaction dynamics, molecular spectroscopy and most recently, biophysical chemistry.
2006 Professor Martin Pope, for his pioneering work in the field of molecular semiconductors which has now become a large and important area of semiconductor science and technology.
2005 Professor Chris Dobson FRS, for his work on the application of NMR and other structural methods for studying protein folding and misfolding, especially the formation of amyloid fibrils, leading to novel insights on protein structure and folding.
2004 Professor Takeshi Oka FRS, for his many and varied contributions to molecular spectroscopy and its applications, particularly to astronomy.
2003 Professor Roger Parsons, for his distinguished career in electochemistry. He developed the method of preparing, for the first time, clean and well-defined metal surfaces and putting them into contact with the electrolyte without contamination.
2002 Neil Bartlett for his research exploring the highest oxidation limits of the less oxidizable elements, primarily using elemental flourine. He has exposed the new chemistry of the noble gases and new procedures for attaining high oxidation state limits across the elements of the periodic table.
2001 Alastair Ian Scott, for his pioneering contributions to the understanding of biosynthetic pathways, and in particular for his work on vitamin B12. He is a world leader in his area and the impact of his discoveries are likely to have a significant effect on the way natural product chemistry progresses into the future.
2000 Steven Victor Ley, in recognition of his invention of new synthetic methods applied to the synthesis of complex natural products including those from insects, micro-organisms and plants. Among his most outstanding successes have been the synthesis of avermectin B1a, tetronasin, the milbemycins and indanomycin as well as his important development of short, practical syntheses of oligosaccharides.
1999 Malcolm Harold Chisholm, in recognition of his leading work in inorganic chemistry, particularly his major impact on the chemistry of transition metals and his pioneering research on the unique triply metal-metal bonded dimolybdenum and ditungsten dialkylamides, alkoxides and alkyls, and for the use of these compounds in further important syntheses.
1998 Alan Roy Fersht, in recognition for his pioneering work on the analysis of proteins by combining the methods and ideas of physical-organic chemistry with those of protein engineering thus illuminating such processes as enzymatic catalysis, protein folding, protein-protein interactions and those macromolecule interactions in general that are dominated by the chemistry of the noncovalent bond.
1997 Jean-Marie Pierre Lehn, in recognition of his work on supramolecular chemistry, on self-assembling molecules and on chemical devices.
1996 Geoffrey Wilkinson, in recognition of his contribution to organotransition metal chemistry and the development of homogeneous catalysis and his work on hydroformylation.
1995 MLH Green, in recognition of his contribution to organometallic chemistry with particular application to catalytic reactions.
1994 John Meurig Thomas, for his pioneering studies of solid-state chemistry, and for the major advances he has made in the design of new materials for heterogeneous catalysis.
1993 Jack E Baldwin, distinguished for his contributions to bio-organic chemistry, in particular to an understanding of the biosynthesis of beta-lactam antibodies.
1992 A Carrington, distinguished for the determination and characterization of the molecular spectra of transient species.
1991 JR Knowles, in recognition of his contributions to mechanistic chemistry integrated with enzymology, particularly the application of chemical methods to solve fundamental biological problems of recognition and catalysis.
1990 Keith Usherwood Ingold, for pioneering the quantitative study of free radical reactions in solution, in glasses and in living organisms, particularly using electron magnetic resonance.