It is my pleasure to share this report celebrating the 25th anniversary of Tan Kah Kee Hall at UC Berkeley and honoring the community of alumni and friends whose partnership helped make this extraordinary structure a reality. Dedicated in 1997, Tan Kah Kee Hall is the most recently constructed facility within the seven-building complex that houses Berkeley’s internationally renowned College of Chemistry. Affectionately known as Tan Hall, the facility provides premium research labs and office space for both the Department of Chemistry and the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, supporting students and faculty as they pursue research solutions that will help build a brighter future.
As we celebrate this milestone anniversary of Tan Kah Kee Hall, I want to extend my heartfelt appreciation for your partnership and offer a few highlights of what your investment has made possible.
An Extraordinary Partnership
Thanks to the generosity of more than 2,000 individuals, corporations, and foundations, Tan Kah Kee Hall was the first building at the College of Chemistry constructed with a majority of private funds. The project marked an exceptional partnership not only between the state and the private sector, but also between the College of Chemistry and a global community of supporters who are deeply invested in Berkeley’s mission as one of the leading scientific institutions in the world. Thank you for being part of that circle of care!
Although it was built in the 1990s, the vision that led to Tan Hall’s construction came about more than a decade earlier. By the time Professor C. Judson King became dean of the College of Chemistry in 1981, the need for a new facility for Berkeley’s chemistry and chemical engineering programs was quite apparent:
“Just about everything that was done during my first few years as dean was directed toward the development of the building project that became Tan Kah Kee Hall. The College of Chemistry had simply run out of space; we’d grown in both people and quantity of research. In addition, the nature of our research was changing—specifically, with the growth in the relatively new field of biochemical engineering—and we needed lab space designed for these new directions. Furthermore, code requirements for research facilities had changed, rendering lab spaces in some of our existing older buildings obsolete. Tan Hall addressed all these needs—and made possible the continuing growth of the College of Chemistry.” --C. Judson King
The university broke ground on its new research building in the spring of 1993. Four years later, on April 12, 1997, Berkeley hosted the dedication ceremony for Tan Kah Kee Hall, in conjunction with the celebration of the College of Chemistry's 125th Anniversary.
Upon the building's dedication, Alexis Bell, who was dean at the time, wrote:
“On the one hand, Tan Hall stands as the culmination of decades of building the excellence of the College, a remarkable institution that is, by all measures, one of the finest of its kind in the world. On the other hand, this magnificent new facility will help us to launch the pioneering work of the new century and of the College’s next 125 years.”
Celebrating Tan Kah Kee: A Pioneer in Education and Social Justice
Berkeley's newest chemistry building is named after Tan Kah Kee (1874-1961), a Southeast Asian business leader, philanthropist, and tireless champion of education and social justice. He was well known throughout Southeast Asia for advocating for the importance of education for the transformation of a society, and for establishing many schools, including several elementary schools, a middle school, a navigation school, a normal school, and Singapore's Amoy University (Xia-Men University).
Berkeley Professor Emeritus Yuan T. Lee, recipient of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, and Chancellor Chang-Lin Tien were key figures in a multi-year international effort to raise funds for the new building. Professor Lee traveled around the U.S., China, Taiwan, Singapore, Indonesia, and other Southeast Asian nations, partnering with individuals who believed the naming of Berkeley’s new chemistry building would be a fitting tribute to Tan Kah Kee’s legacy and profound commitment to education. To coordinate and further the effort, the Tan Kah Kee International Society was formed, with Professor Lee serving as its chair. Thousands of individuals and more than one hundred corporate and private foundations gave to the building project, including the Singapore-based Tan Kah Kee Foundation, which continues to promote the spirit of Tan Kah Kee through entrepreneurship and the promotion of education.
“On behalf of the College of Chemistry and UC Berkeley, I want to extend my appreciation to the international community of supporters whose partnership helped build Tan Kah Kee Hall. Your investment expanded the College’s innovative research, empowered new directions in science and scholarship, and paid an honorable tribute to the legacy and spirit of Tan Kah Kee, a man who devoted his life to bettering the world through education. Thank you for your generosity.” --Yuan T. Lee, Professor Emeritus, Awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, 1986
The Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
When Tan Hall opened in 1997, it addressed the immediate need for new lab space to house the College of Chemistry's growing chemical engineering program, which was renamed the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering in 2010, to recognize the substantial research and teaching in the areas of biochemical and biomedical engineering, biotechnology, and synthetic biology. Since the building opened 25 years ago, several floors of Tan Hall have been devoted entirely to chemical engineering research.
Today, more than a dozen chemical engineering professors have their labs in Tan Hall, where they pursue groundbreaking research in areas like catalysis and reaction engineering, electrochemical engineering, polymers and complex fluids, microsystems technology and microelectrics, molecular simulations and theory, interfacial engineering, biochemical and bioprocess engineering, biomedical engineering, and synthetic biology. Follow the links below to learn more about the professors of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering who have conducted research in Tan Hall:
- Nitash P. Balsara
- Alexis T. Bell
- Douglas S. Clark (Dean, College of Chemistry)
- Joelle Frechette
- Enrique Iglesia
- Roya Maboudian
- Ali Mesbah
- Clayton Radke
- Jeffrey Reimer (emeritus professor and department chair)
- Rachel Segalman (2004-2014)
- Harvey Blanch (emeritus)
- Elton Cairns (emeritus)
- Morton Denn (emeritus)
- David Graves (emeritus)
- Susan J. Muller (emerita)
Doug Clark, current dean of the College of Chemistry, and Professor Emeritus Harvey Blanch and are among the prominent chemical engineering professors who have conducted research in Tan Hall over the past quarter century. Professors Clark and Blanch have worked on a broad range of topics central to biotechnology, including biocatalysis, mammalian cell culture, and bioseparations, and are pioneers in the development of energy generation technologies using biomass as a sustainable source. In addition, these two renowned researchers literally “wrote the book” when it comes to biochemical engineering.
The Department of Chemistry
In addition to providing crucial lab space for chemical engineering, Tan Hall also expanded research capacity within the Department of Chemistry. Upon the building's dedication, two full floors were devoted to synthetic chemistry, a growing field in which Berkeley had recently hired two senior faculty, including Professor Robert Bergman, who is still with the college. Several underground floors offer vibration-free lab space that is essential for certain varieties of research in physical chemistry.
Today, Tan Hall provides lab space for chemistry professors pursuing research within each of the four primary concentrations of our doctoral program in chemistry: physical chemistry, synthetic chemistry (including an emphasis in either organic or inorganic chemistry), theoretical chemistry, and chemical biology. Follow the links below to learn more about the work of a few of the chemistry professors who have worked in Tan Hall:
T. Don Tilley, the PMP Tech Chancellor's Chair in Chemistry, is among the renowned professors who have made their research homes in Tan Hall over the past quarter century. Tilley completed his PhD at Berkeley in 1982, and returned to join the faculty in 1994, when Tan Hall was still under construction. Since the building opened in 1997, Tilley and his group have maintained lab space in Tan Hall, focusing on the discovery of new chemical processes and materials designed to impact technologies in energy and sustainability. Their efforts include aspects of inorganic, organometallic, silicon, and organic materials chemistry, with emphasis on exploratory syntheses and transition metal-based catalysis. In addition, the Tilley Group's interest in molecular-level design of complex materials has led to a deeper understanding of the key water-splitting reaction at metal-oxygen clusters and the synthesis of nanocarbons mimicking graphene and carbon nanotubes.
Professor Alanna Schepartz, who holds the T.Z. and Irmgard Chu Distinguished Chair in Chemistry and is an Investigator of the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub, came to Berkeley and Tan Hall in 2019 after more than three decades on the faculty at Yale University. As a Professor of Chemistry and of Molecular and Cell Biology, as well as a faculty affiliate of the California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3), Schepartz and her research group explore questions that span the chemistry-biology continuum. They are applying the tools of organic synthesis, biochemistry, biophysics, and structural, molecular, and synthetic biology, studying the chemistry of complex cellular processes and applying this knowledge to design or discover molecules with unique or useful properties. Schepartz celebrates the many opportunities for her research to expand in collaboration with her colleagues at Berkeley:
“The ways in which my science has been enriched since we arrived at Berkeley are too numerous to count. I frequently talk to colleagues and we’ll figure out that we have overlapping interests and that there’s a new experiment or collaboration that we can do as a team that we wouldn’t have been able to do alone.”
In addition to providing research space for faculty and students, Tan Hall also features the Chevron Computer Lab, the molecular graphics and computing facility that serves more than 50 research groups, a chemical storage and redistribution center, and a lecture hall that hosts classes within the College of Chemistry, as well as other university lectures and special events.
On the top floor of the seven-story building is the Ross and Irma McCollum Room, a magnificent conference and classroom space leading to a balcony that offers an unparalleled view of the campanile, the campus, and the San Francisco Bay.
Thank You for Your Partnership
As Berkeley celebrates both the 25th anniversary of Tan Kah Kee Hall and the 150th anniversary of the College of Chemistry, we do so with deep appreciation for all who have invested in the College's groundbreaking work, including partners like you who gave generously to make Tan Hall possible. Thank you for the vision, energy, and commitment you brought to this project more than 25 years ago. As the College of Chemistry looks forward to its next 150 years, I remain grateful for your continuing commitment, as together we seek to advance society through education and research. Fiat Lux!
Warmly,
Carol T. Christ, Chancellor