Organic Chemistry – 5th Edition

Janice Gorzynski Smith was born in Schenectady, New York. She became interested in chemistry in high school and went on to major in chemistry at Cornell University, where she received an A.B. degree summa cum laude. Jan earned a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Harvard University under the direction of Nobel Laureate E. J. Corey, and she also spent a year as a National Science Foundation National Needs Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard. During her tenure with the Corey group, she completed the total synthesis of the plant growth hormone gibberellic acid.
Following her postdoctoral work, Jan joined the faculty of Mount Holyoke College, where she was employed for 21 years. During this time she was active in teaching organic chemistry lecture and lab courses, conducting a research program in organic synthesis, and serving as department chair. Her organic chemistry class was named one of Mount Holyoke’s “Don’tmiss courses” in a survey by Boston magazine. After spending two sabbaticals amidst the natural beauty and diversity in Hawai‘i in the 1990s, Jan and her family moved there permanently in 2000. She is currently a faculty member at the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa, where she teaches the two-semester organic chemistry lecture and lab courses. In 2003, she received the Chancellor’s Citation for Meritorious Teaching.
Jan resides in Hawai‘i with her husband Dan, an emergency medicine physician, pictured with her hiking in New Zealand in 2015. She has four children and three grandchildren. When not teaching, writing, or enjoying her family, Jan bikes, hikes, snorkels, and scuba dives in sunny Hawai‘i, and time permitting, enjoys travel and Hawaiian quilting.