A warm welcome to Robert Mayer, who joins us from the group of Prof. Herbert Mayr and Prof. Armin Ofial at the LMU Munich, where he worked on kinetic, mechanistic, and computational studies to elucidate fundamental reactivity trends of different classes of electrophiles and nucleophiles. In our group, Robert will work on mechanistic challenges in prebiotic chemistry. Welcome, Robert!
The fourth paper from our collaboration with the Ebbesen group describes how running a reaction between two appropriately-spaced mirrors can change the stereoselectivity of a electrocyclic ring-opening reaction. The article has appeared in Angewandte Chemie. Congrats to Abhijit (first author) and Lucas from our group and also to all authors from the Ebbesen group!
Abhijit thanks the EU for a H2020 Marie Skłodowska Curie Fellowship (project 792101)!
Congrats to Florent Noel on successfully defending his thesis! He is the seventh PhD student to graduate from the group. Special thanks to jury members Prof. Philippe Belmont, Dr. Christophe Bour and Dr. Mihaela Gulea for being part of the jury, which was done partly in person and partly over Zoom. Unfortunately, no pot de thèse was possible due to the coronavirus pandemic, but we will have a real party as soon as it is feasible (hopefully by the summer)!
Joseph has been awarded an ERC Consolidator Grant (2 million €)! The award will allow us to pursue our dream to create reaction networks that resemble biological metabolism. Informal inquiries regarding postdoctoral positions related to this project are encouraged at any time.
A warm welcome to Quentin Dherbassy, who joins us from a prior postdoctoral appointment in Prof. David Procter’s group at the University of Manchester. Quentin will work with Dr. Kamila Muchowska on her efforts to explore the prebiotic origins and functions of biological cofactors. Welcome, Quentin!
A warm welcome to Marie Vayer, who joins us from a prior postdoctoral appointment in Prof. Nuno Maulide’s group at the University of Vienna. Marie will work on the development of new synthetic methods exploiting HFIP. Welcome, Marie!
The seventh incoming class of PhD students joins the group. Cyprien, funded by the CSC Graduate School, will work on Vibrational Strong Coupling. Emilie, funded by a ENS scholarship, and Joris, funded by an MRT fellowship, will both work on proto-metabolism. A warm welcome to all three!
Joseph has received the 2020 “Forcheurs Jean-Marie Lehn” prize together with Harun Tüysüz (Max–Planck-Institut for Coal research, Mülheim, Germany) for their collaborative work on transition metals in prebiotic chemistry. The prize supports promising collaborations between young French and German researchers in the areas of health, pharmacology or chemistry. The prize is co-organized by the French Embassy in Berlin and the Université Franco-Allemande, and generously sponsored by BASF France and Sanofi Deutschland. A ceremony was held in Berlin on September 29, 2020. More information can be found here.
Valentyn Pozhydaiev and Martin Power’s feature article on the role of the solvent HFIP in Brønsted and Lewis acid catalyzed reactions has been published in Chemical Communications. Most of this writing was a product of their M1 and M2 stages, respectively and was carried out while the lab was shut down due to COVID-19. Congrats!
A warm welcome to Nicolas Zeidan, who has obtained a Marie Curie fellowship from the European Commission to join our lab. The project is called NonEnzymatic and will investigate non-enzymatic metabolic reactions in prebiotic chemistry. Nicolas comes to us from Mark Lautens’ group at the University of Toronto, where he worked on Pd-catalyzed methods for heterocycle synthesis. Congrats and welcome, Nicolas!
