Robert H. Grubbs was born near Possum Trot, Kentucky and studied Chemistry at  the University of Florida, Gainesville (B.S. and M.S.) and Columbia University,  New York, where he obained his Ph.D. under Ronald Breslow in 1968. Following a  one-year NIH postdoctoral fellowship with James Collman at Stanford University  he was appointed to the faculty of Michigan State University. In 1978 he moved  to California Institute of Technology where he is presently Victor and Elizabeth  Atkins Professor of Chemistry. His research interests involve the design,  synthesis, and mechanistic studies of complexes that catalyze useful organic  transformations. In recent years the major focus of his group has been on the  development of catalysts for the olefin metathesis reaction that are extremely  tolerant of organic functional groups, and their use in the ring opening  polymerization of cyclic olefins to yield polymers with useful mechanical,  electronic or optcal properties. These catalysts are also widely use in organic  synthesis and the "Grubbs catalyst" is even commercially available. Professor  Grubbs's many awards have included Alfred P. Sloan Fellow (1974-76), Camille and  Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award (1975-78), Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship  (1975), ACS National Award in Organometallic Chemistry (1988), Arthur C. Cope  Scholar (1990), ACS Award in polymer Chemistry (1995), Nagoya Medal of Organic  Chemistry (1997), Fluka Reagent of the Year (1998), Mack Memorial Award (1999),  Benjamin Franklin Medal in Chemistry (2000), ACS Herman F. Mark Polymer  Chemistry Award (2000) and ACS Herbert C. Brown Award for Creative Research in  Synthetic Methods (2001). He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in  1989 and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1994.