Robert R. Williams
February 16, 1886 - October 2, 1965
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Scientific Discipline: Chemistry Membership Type:
Member
(elected 1945)
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Robert R. Williams’s work with the chemistry of vitamins aided many people suffering from malnutrition. After twenty-five years of experimentation, he was able to isolate and determine the chemical structure of vitamin B1, later named thiamine. He then devised a synthesis reaction to produce thiamine in high volumes at a low cost. His discoveries were vital to the development of enriched grains, which helped to alleviate the effects of vitamin B1 deficiency and general malnutrition.
Williams graduated from the University of Chicago, earning his BS degree in 1907 and his MS degree in chemistry in 1908. He worked as a chemist at the Interior Department in the Bureau of Science, Manila, Philippines, from 1909 until 1915, when he was called to Washington, D.C., to work at the Agriculture Department’s Bureau of Chemistry. In 1925 he began work at the Bell Telephone Laboratories in New York while he pursued his interest in isolating and identifying thiamine. He was successful in analyzing the compound in 1933, and by 1935 he had established the Williams-Waterman Fund for the Combat of Dietary Diseases. He retired as the chemical director at Bell Laboratories in 1945 and chaired the Williams-Waterman Fund from 1950 to 1956.
