Los Angeles Times

A Caltech Nobel laureate celebrates his 100th birthday. Then he gets back to work

Lev Marcus, 14, signs a card for his grandfather, Nobel laureate Rudy Marcus, who celebrated his 100th birthday with a day of festivities at the California Institute of Technology on July 21, 2023, in Pasadena, California.

Say you wake up on the morning of your 100th birthday, having achieved the pinnacle of recognition in your chosen field and the warm esteem of family, friends and colleagues. How would you celebrate the day ahead?

"Work," quipped Caltech chemistry professor Rudy Marcus at a lunch in honor of his centenary Friday.

But the university where he's been on the faculty for 45 years had other plans, so the Nobel laureate good-naturedly agreed to a symposium in his honor.

Generations of Marcus' colleagues and former students gathered at , Caltech's faculty club, to celebrate a scientist who still reports to the book-lined office he has occupied on the Pasadena campus since 1978, and whose inquisitiveness and generous spirit remains undimmed.

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