David S. Breslow

Breslow was born on August 13, 1916,[3] and raised in Queens, New York.[2] He developed an early interest in chemistry after inheriting a chemistry set which he and a friend used to make stink bombs.[4] He graduated from City College of New York in 1937 and subsequently earned a doctorate in organic chemistry from Duke University in 1940.[5][6] During World War II, he did post-doctoral work at the California Institute of Technology and research at the University of California, Berkeley and Duke.[2][6]

In 1946, he joined the chemical manufacturing company Hercules.[2] He rose through the ranks, and in 1971, he was named senior research associate of the New Enterprise Department, the top technical position at the company.[7]

His research focused on polymers.[1] He helped develop catalysts for the chemical reactions that produce polyethylene and polypropylene, and worked on the stabilization of those materials, leading to a wide array of consumer plastics applications.[1] He also conducted research on the potential use of copolymer MVE-2 as a cancer drug.[8][4]

He taught part-time at the University of Delaware from 1972 to 1987.[5] During the 1964–1965 academic year, he took a sabbatical at the University of Munich in Germany,[7] and in 1971 he taught at the University of Notre Dame.[5]

Over the course of his career, he acquired 79 patents[2] and authored 90 scientific papers as well as a two-volume textbook on polymers.[5]

He was president of the Delaware chapter of the American Chemical Society (ACS), and later served on the national ACS board of directors.[9]

Breslow retired in 1982.[2] In 1988, he received the ACS Award in Applied Polymer Science.[10] He died on May 26, 1995, at Christiana Hospital in Newark, Delaware.[1]

Breslow married Ann Goodman after World War II.[2] They had three children[1] and lived in Brandywine Hundred outside Wilmington, Delaware.[2] He was a member of Congregation Beth Shalom.[2]

• Breslow, David S. (1966). The Chemistry of Heterocyclic Compounds: Multi‐Sulfur and Sulfur and Oxygen Five‐ and Six‐Membered Heterocycles. New York: Interscience Publishers. ISBN 978-0-470-38196-0.