on a summer day in ann arbor michigan two young teenage boys stood up to their knees in pond water intently studying its depths excitement flickered in one of the boys eyes as he spotted movement and he quickly lowered a jar to scoop up several tadpoles with legs he surveyed his prize thinking of the basement-based experiments and creations they would fund when he sold them to a local scientific company where some would see only tiny wriggling creatures he saw opportunity this entrepreneurial vision for scientific and commercial opportunity would become a defining characteristic for dr jan troup 74 it led him to texas a&m university where he studied for his doctorate under the foremost inorganic chemist of his time it helped him launch his first business that pioneered a new field and it sustained him throughout a career of innovation now this lens of opportunity is inspiring troups planned gift to support the college of sciences future and extend his innovative legacy into tomorrow learning from the best troups early scientific pursuits led him to earn a bachelors in chemistry from eastern michigan university and seek out some of the greatest chemistry minds for his graduate work at ohio university he earned his masters in inorganic chemistry under dr abraham clearfield who later taught at texas a&m for more than 40 years when troup heard that dr f albert cotton one of the worlds leading inorganic chemists was taking up a position at texas a&m he seized the opportunity and traveled to aggieland for his doctorate cotton who would become one of the most decorated faculty members at texas a&m during his decades-long career at the university had just moved to texas from the massachusetts institute of technology and accepted troup as his first graduate student in aggieland but having such a distinguished professor brought its own pressures it was intimidating troup recalled he was an amazing person and had already written a bunch of books including the bible in inorganic chemistry nevertheless troup rose to the occasion publishing more than 20 papers with cotton using single crystal x-ray diffraction a method that allows scientists to observe the molecular structure of a substance he also received the universitys new distinguished graduate student award after cotton nominated him jan proved to be an excellent student cotton wrote in his autobiography titled my life in the golden age of chemistry: more fun than fun he was also one of my all-time best well up to the standard i was used to at mit pioneering an industry while troup was working with x-ray diffraction the method gained promise as a new drug development tool previously the process was only available to university researchers but as it became more efficient troup recognized the methods commercial potential its like having a microscope at the atomic level he explained you get the structure of an enzyme and then you input the drug youre developing to see how it works on the actual biological molecule so youre using the structure to continually improve the drug in 1973 while studying for his phd troup partnered with two postdoctoral students to launch molecular structure corp the worlds first company to offer commercial x-ray diffraction services there was just one problem: we needed an expensive computer and x-ray equipment and we were poor graduate students troup recalled cotton offered them a solution he would share his x-ray equipment if they bought the computer and let chemistry students use it we couldnt have started the company if he hadnt agreed to do that troup said thanks to the support the company soon grew troup became the sole proprietor and moved the business to the woodlands where it expanded to international offices in germany and britain and gained a 60% world market share in x-ray analytical equipment his clients included large pharmaceutical and chemical companies such as pfizer union carbide and monsanto and the companys success launched a new industry in x-ray crystallographic services and advanced equipment soon every large university and company had their own crystallography department troup said we were the seed company showing it could be done many of the drugs on the market today were designed with equipment i sold to companies and im very proud of that heritage in 1996 troup sold molecular structure corp to a japanese partner firm he then formed a company that sold an underwater breathing rescue system he invented but he always kept an eye out for new opportunities he found one at texas a&m in 2001 dr ronald macfarlane in the chemistry department had invented a more precise cholesterol test that caught his attention and troup developed it into a patented product he sold the technology to spectracell laboratories a few years later where it soon served more than 600 people daily troup continued to hone the tests as spectracells director of lipid science and associate lab director while developing additional side projects expanding his number of patents to seven in 2018 he retired from a 45-year career of bringing innovations to the market im most proud of the technology that has helped people troup said many advances have aided companies in the development of new drugs or saved lives through advanced testing i felt that was a positive outcome from my efforts expanding innovation even in retirement troup hasnt stopped innovating he continues to work on several research projects including additional lipoprotein technologies and a detector for advanced cancer markers the latter was inspired by personal tragedy when troups wife ellen passed away last year from cancer it was unexpected troup said she had a marker that looked suspicious but we didnt realize until too late that it may have been a marker for her cancer through it all troup never forgot the start he received from cottons support and his time at texas a&m the projects ive pursued in my career have been totally different than my training but my education at texas a&m gave me the tools to develop in these other areas he explained recognizing this he and ellen created a distinguished graduate student award for chemistry students in 2019 inspired by the award he received during his time at texas a&m i was grateful to receive that award and i wanted other people to have the same feeling he explained now troup is expanding his innovative legacy through a gift in his estate that will create future chairs in inorganic chemistry and analytical and physical chemistry his planned gift will also foster the next generation of innovators through an endowed fund providing commercialization support for chemistry graduate students the fund was inspired by the way cotton helped jumpstart my career troup explained its an important component because scientists often develop ideas but lack the funds to commercialize them and attract an outside buyer texas a&m is on the right innovative path and i hope my gift will inspire students who want to be successful in this area that would be a fantastic legacy as he continues to pursue scientific and commercial potential troups generosity will be a catalyst for generations of new ideas from future aggies who like him pursue innovation no matter what form it takes your degree may be in organometallic chemistry he said but theres nothing wrong with developing ideas in physical chemistry analytical chemistry or medical areas and making history see the original feature as published by the texas a&m foundation in heritage magazine spring 2022 # # # # # # # # # # where passion finds purpose: the texas a&m foundation builds a brighter future for texas a&m university one relationship at a time by uniting generosity and vision to raise and manage major endowed gifts learn more at https://wwwtxamfoundationcom/