From 1942 to 1944, Barton was a government research chemist, then from 1944 to 1945 he worked forAlbright and Wilson inBirmingham. He then became Assistant Lecturer in the Department of Chemistry of Imperial College, and from 1946 to 1949 he wasICI Research Fellow.
During 1949 and 1950, he was a visiting lecturer in natural products chemistry atHarvard University, and was then appointed reader in organic chemistry and, in 1953, professor atBirkbeck College. In 1955, he becameRegius Professor of Chemistry at theUniversity of Glasgow, and in 1957, he was appointed professor of organic chemistry atImperial College, London. In 1950, Barton showed that organic molecules could be assigned a preferredconformation based upon results accumulated by chemical physicists, in particular byOdd Hassel. Using this new technique ofconformational analysis, he later determined the geometry of many other natural product molecules.
In 1969, Barton shared theNobel Prize in Chemistry with Odd Hassel for “contributions to the development of the concept of conformation and its application in chemistry."
In 1977, on the occasion of the centenary of the Royal Institute of Chemistry, the British Post Office honoured him, and 5 other Nobel Prize-winning British chemists, with a series of four postage stamps featuring aspects of their discoveries.[7]
Sir Derek married three times: Jeanne Kate Wilkins (on 20 December 1944); Christiane Cognet (died 1992) (in 1969); and Judith Von-Leuenberger Cobb (1939-2012) (in 1993).[11] He had a son by his first marriage.[when?]
^Albert Cotton, F. (2000). "Derek H. R. Barton, 8 September 1918 · 16 March 1998".Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society.144 (3):292–296.JSTOR1515591.
