Paul Barbara

Paul F. Barbara, born in 1953, is an American scientist, the R.J.V. Johnson-Welch Endowed Chair in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at The University of Texas at Austin. He is also the the Director of UT Austin's Center for Nano- and Molecular Science and Technology and the senior editor of the journal Accounts of Chemical Research.

He received his bachelor’s degree in 1974 at the Hofstra University and completed his doctoral work in 1978 at Brown University. Before coming to Texas in 1998, Dr. Barbara was the 3M-Alumni Distinguished Professor of Chemistry at the University of Minnesota. His research interests includes molecular structure and dynamics of complex chemical systems, organic semiconductors, proton and electron transfer reactions and the hydrated electron.

He was elected elected to the National Academy of Sciences on 25 April 2006. In September 2008, he received the 2009 E. Bright Wilson Award in Spectroscopy from The American Chemical Society.