Professor Barany to speak at stamp dedication ceremony

Professor George Barany has been asked to speak at the official first-day-of-issue dedication ceremony for commemorative stamps honoring American scientists Melvin Calvin, Asa Gray, Maria Goeppert Mayer, and Severo Ochoa. The dedication ceremony is scheduled for 11 a.m. Thursday, June 16, at the Science Museum of Minnesota.

Calvin (1911-1997) was the first scientist to trace in detail the process of photosynthesis and conducted pioneering research on using plants as an alternative energy source. Gray (1810-1888), one of the first professional botanists in the United States, advanced the specialized field of plant geography and became the principal American advocate of evolutionary theory in the mid-nineteenth century. Mayer (1906-1972) developed a theoretical model that helped explain the structure of the atomic nucleus; for this work she became the only woman other than Marie Curie to win a Nobel Prize in physics. Ochoa (1905-1993) was the first scientist to synthesize ribonucleic acid and competed in the race to decipher the genetic code.