Giulio Natta
Giulio Natta (26 February 1903 – 2 May 1979) was an Italian chemical engineer and Nobel laureate. He won a Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1963 with Karl Ziegler for work on high polymers. He was also a recipient of Lomonosov Gold Medal in 1969. Biography. Early years. Natta was born in Imperia, Italy. He earned his degree in chemical engineering from the Politecnico di Milano university in Milan in 1924. In 1927 he passed the exams for becoming a professor there. From 1929 to 1933, he was also in charge of physical chemistry at the Faculty of Sciences  of the University of Milan. In 1933 he became a full professor and the director of the Institute of General Chemistry of Pavia University, where he stayed until 1935. During this time he began using crystallography to elucidate the structures of a wide variety of molecules including phosphine, arsine and others. In that year he was appointed full professor in physical chemistry at the University of Rome. Career. From 1936 to 1938 he moved as a full professor and director of the Institute of Industrial Chemistry at the Polytechnic Institute of Turin. In 1938 he took over as the head  of the Department of chemical engineering at the Politecnico di Milano university, in a somewhat controversial manner, when his predecessor was forced to step down because of racial laws against Jews being introduced in Fascist Italy. Natta's work at Politecnico di Milano led to the improvement of earlier work by Karl Ziegler and to the development of the Ziegler–Natta catalyst. He received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1963 with Karl Ziegler for their research in high polymers. Personal life. In 1935 Natta married Rosita Beati; a graduate in literature, she coined the terms "isotactic", "atactic" and "syndiotactic