Ei-ichi Negishi (根岸 英一, Negishi Eiichi, July 14, 1935 – June 6, 2021) was a Japanese chemist who was best known for his discovery of the Negishi coupling.^[2][3] He spent most of his career at Purdue University in the United States, where he was the Herbert C. Brown Distinguished Professor and the director of the Negishi-Brown Institute.^[4] He was awarded the 2010 Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for palladium catalyzed cross couplings in organic synthesis" jointly with Richard F. Heck and Akira Suzuki.^[5]

Negishi was born in Xinjing (today known as Changchun), the capital of Manchukuo, in July 1935.^[6][3] Following the transfer of his father who worked at the South Manchuria Railway in 1936, he moved to Harbin, and lived eight years there.^[7] In 1943, when he was nine, the Negishi family moved to Incheon, and a year later to Kyongsong Prefecture (now Seoul), both in Japanese-occupied Korea. In November 1945, three months after World War II ended, they moved to Japan.^[3] Since he excelled as a student, a year ahead of what would have been his graduation from grammar school, he was admitted to an elite secondary school, Shonan High School.^[8] At the age of 17, he gained admission to the University of Tokyo. After graduation from the University of Tokyo in 1958, Negishi did his internship at Teijin, where he conducted research on polymer chemistry.^[9] Later, he continued his studies in the United States after having won a Fulbright Scholarship and obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1963, under the supervision of professor Allan R. Day.^[10][3]

After obtaining his Ph.D., Negishi decided to become an academic researcher.^[11] Although he was hoping to work at a Japanese university, he could not find a position.^[12] In 1966 he resigned from Teijin, and became a postdoctoral associate at Purdue University, working under future Nobel laureate Herbert C. Brown. From 1968 to 1972 he was an instructor at Purdue.^[13]

In 1972, he became an assistant professor at Syracuse University, where began his lifelong study of transition metal–catalyzed reactions,^[14] and was promoted to associate professor in 1979.^[15] He returned to Purdue University as a full professor in the same year.^[16]

He discovered Negishi coupling, a process which condenses organic zinc compounds and organic halides under a palladium or nickel catalyst to obtain a C-C bonded product. For this achievement, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2010.^[17] Negishi also reported that organoaluminum compounds and organic zirconium compounds can be used for cross-coupling. He did not seek a patent for this coupling technology and explained his reasoning as follows: "If we did not obtain a patent, we thought that everyone could use our results easily."^[18] In addition, Zr(C₅H₅)₂ obtained by reducing zirconocene dichloride is also called Negishi reagent, which can be used in oxidative cyclisation reactions.^[19][20] The technique he developed is estimated to be used in a quarter of all reactions in the pharmaceutical industry.^[3]

By the time Negishi retired in 2019, he had published more than 400 academic papers.^[3] He was committed to instilling rigorous practices in his lab, emphasizing the need of keeping organized and comprehensive records. Before any separations, he asked his student to evaluate crude reaction mixtures in order to minimize loss of any useful scientific information.^[14]

Negishi began dating Sumire Suzuki in his freshman year and they announced their engagement to their parents in March 1958.^[33] They had met at a choir of which they were both members at in university.^[3] They married the next year and together they had two daughters.^[34]

Negishi loved playing the piano and conducting. During the "Pacifichem" 2015 conference's closing ceremony, he conducted an orchestra.^[14]

• List of Japanese Nobel laureates
• Richard F. Heck
• Makoto Kumada
• Akira Suzuki
• Kenkichi Sonogashira