View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE CROATICA CHEMICA ACTA CCACAA 77 (1–2) 1¿15 (2004) ISSN-0011-1643 CCA-2896 Essay Nenad Trinajsti} – Pioneer of Chemical Graph Theory* Milan Randi} 3225 Kingman Rd, Ames, IA 50014, USA (E-mail:
[email protected]) RECEIVED APRIL 10, 2003; REVISED SEPTEMBER 18, 2003; ACCEPTED SEPTEMBER 21, 2003 We present a brief overview of many contributions of Nenad Trinajsti} to Chemical Graph Theory, an important and fast developing branch of Theoretical Chemistry. In addition, we out- line briefly the various activities of Trinajsti} within the chemical community of Croatia. As can be seen, his scientific work has been very productive and has not abated despite the hostili- Key words ties towards the Chemical Graph Theory in certain chemical circles over the past 30 years. On chemical graph theory the contrary, Trinajsti} continued, widened the areas of his research interest, which started with history of chemical graph theory investigating the close relationship between Graph Theory and HMO, and demonstrated the history of Croatian chemistry importance of Chemical Graph Theory for chemistry. In more than one way he has proven the mathematical chemistry opponents of Chemical Graph Theory wrong, though some continue to fail to recognize the im- scientific biography portance of Graph Theory in Chemistry. INTRODUCTION not so easy to solve. Let us illustrate this with The First Theorem of Graph Theory: We will review the selected work of Nenad Trinajsti} in Any graph contains an even number of vertices of the area of Chemical Graph Theory, but first of all we odd degree.