He worked on a wide range of subjects, including electrochemistry, chemical kinetics, catalysis, electrophoresis, colloids and surface chemistry.
[1] After graduating in 1910, he continued his studies in Germany, obtaining his PhD in chemistry in 1912 at the University of Bonn under Richard Anschütz.
[7] He returned home and enlisted with the Artists Rifles, eventually serving on the Western Front at the Somme in 1916 with the Royal Engineers.
[1] He was invalided home the same year after an outbreak of dysentery, and spent the rest of the war carrying out research in catalysis at University College London under Frederick G.
[6] He then returned to the UK to take up a fellowship at his old college (Trinity Hall), and the Humphrey Owen Jones lectureship in physical chemistry at Cambridge.
[1] It was on the return voyage from the US by ship in 1920 that he met his future wife Peggy (Margaret Atlee Jackson), whom he married the following year.
[4] Following World War II, Rideal left Cambridge to take up the position of Fullerian Professor of Chemistry at the Royal Institution in London (1946 to 1949).
[1] After his retirement in 1955, Rideal took up a position as senior research fellow at Imperial College, enabling him to write the book Concepts in Catalysis (1968).
[6] Rideal was awarded the Davy Medal of the Royal Society in 1951 "For his distinguished contributions to the subject of surface chemistry".
[12] Between 1951 and 1967 Rideal received honorary degrees from the universities of Dublin, Birmingham, Brunel, Belfast, Turin, and Bonn.