Roald Hoffman sheet 2017

Renowned American scientist and Nobel Prize winner in chemistry Roald Hoffmann (born Rual Safran) was born on July 18, 1937, in Zolochiv, Lviv Region, then part of Poland, into a Jewish family. His father, Hillel Safran, was an engineer and graduate of Lviv Polytechnic, and his mother, Klara Rosen, was a teacher. It is known that he was named after the famous Norwegian polar explorer Roald Amundsen.

When asked why he chose chemistry as his profession and whether he ever thought he would become a Nobel laureate, he replied: "I chose chemistry by accident and it took me a long time to pluck up the courage to tell my parents that I didn't want to be a doctor. Besides, I thought (now I realize I was wrong) that I wasn't smart enough to understand physics. As for the Nobel Prize, an old friend of mine once reminded me that at the age of 17, I really wanted to become a Nobel laureate. But by the time I graduated from school, I already understood that if you want to be a good chemist, you shouldn't make the Nobel Prize your goal."

During World War II, the entire Hoffman family was sent to a Nazi ghetto, then to a labor camp. In early 1943, his father managed to secretly take his wife and son out of the camp to the Ukrainian village of Univ, near Zolochiv. Hillel Safran was killed by the Nazis while attempting to start a rebellion in the camp. The same fate befell most of their family members.

After the war, having crossed the borders of Poland, Czechoslovakia, Austria, and Germany, and having stayed in camps for displaced persons, he and his mother arrived in America in 1949. Roald was 11 years old at the time.

After the war, his mother remarried. Pavel Hoffman became his stepfather, and Roald took his surname. His stepfather died two days before Roald was awarded the Nobel Prize; they had maintained a warm relationship until the end.

After arriving in the United States, he attended middle school, high school, and Columbia University. 

As a graduate student at Harvard University in 1960, Hoffman, under an exchange program, ended up at Moscow University, where he worked with the outstanding Ukrainian physicist O.S. Davydov (who was head of the Department of Quantum Theory at Moscow University at the time).
Hoffman then went on to work at Cornell University, where he received the title of professor of physical sciences (1974).

Roald Hoffmann was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry (jointly with Kenichi Fukui) in 1981 for developing a generalized quantum theory of chemical reactions. It is possible that his interest in quantum theory was sparked by his internship with O.S. Davydov.

Incidentally, the Japanese scientist Fukui, with whom Hoffman shared the prize, worked independently of Hoffman. His articles were little known because they were published mainly in Japanese journals.

Hoffman managed to reestablish his connection with Ukraine and the family of Mykola and Maria Duk 10 years after the war. They not only corresponded, but also exchanged gifts. Once, Maria Duk asked Roald's mother to send her thread for embroidering a towel — traditional red, black, and green colors. After embroidering a Ukrainian shirt with that thread, Maria sent it as a gift to America.

Hoffman first visited Ukraine in 2006.

“When we went to Ukraine, the Dukes' children took that towel out of the chest. And it's more than just embroidered fabric. It's a connection between our two families.”

Artist - Natalia Andriichenko
Country - Ukraine
Release Date - 07/18/2017
The circulation - 140 000
Number of stamps in the minisheet - 12