Katritzky stayed on at Oxford as an independent researcher, from 1954 to 1958, directing a small group at the Dyson Perrins Laboratory; his main interest was in pyridines.

[7] Much effort was expended in preparing undergraduate courses, designing and building new laboratories, and recruiting some 25 faculty members, in addition to carrying out his research in heterocyclic chemistry.

So, in that year, Katritzky accepted the Kenan Chair of Chemistry at the University of Florida, which was a research professorship, with no requirement to provide lectures to undergraduates.

"[1] For many years, Katritzky conducted annual worldwide lecture tours and over the course of his career "he served as a consultant to 32 companies throughout Europe and North America".

His consultancy for 3M continued for a long time, with visits to their headquarters at St Paul, Minnesota, their Harlow laboratories, and their subsidiary Ferrania in Savona, Italy.

[1] “During 60 years of research, Professor Katritzky's output was prodigious with over 2170 papers in the primary scientific literature plus authorship or editorship of more than 200 books.

He and his wife Linde made a charitable donation to start Arkivoc, hoping that the journal would particularly help authors and readers in developing countries.

In the same year, Katritzky started annual Florida Heterocyclic & Synthetic Chemistry (FloHet) conferences, anticipating that they could provide revenue to support the journal.

[3] "His work was recognized throughout the world by 33 honorary doctorates or professorships and awards.”[3] Amongst the latter were: Alan Katritzky met Agnes Juliane Dietlinde Kilian (Linde) while skiing in Germany in 1949.