Association of Chemists Honors Young Researcher from LIKAT

12-Mar-2024

The Association of German University Professors of Chemistry, ADUC for short, has honored Dr. Jola Pospech from the Leibniz Institute for catalysis in Rostock with this year's ADUC Prize. The chemist accepted the prize on March 11 at the opening ceremony of the Chemistry Lecturers' Conference in Aachen. Each year, the ADUC recognizes up to three young researchers for establishing an independent field of research.

Her scientific publications "very much impressed" the selection committee, as the ADUC board put it in its communication to the chemist. In 2017, Jola Pospech took over the leadership of a junior research group that deals with the catalytic functionalization of organic compounds. Functionalization means linking molecules with chemical groups that are responsible for the medical effect of a drug, for example.

Specifically, Dr. Pospech is being honoured "for her creative contributions in the field of photoredox catalysis", as the ADUC citation goes on to say. Photoredox catalysis is a field of organic synthesis chemistry in which the starting materials are activated with light instead of heat. This form of catalysis is becoming increasingly important in the development of new pharmaceuticals and in many other disciplines in chemistry. It involves so-called free radicals, special particles that lack an electron in their atomic structure. Electrons are usually present in pairs and play a role when substances form new chemical bonds.

The Association of German University Professors of Chemistry has been in existence for well over a hundred years. It was founded in 1897 as an association of laboratory directors at German universities and has been a working group within the GDCh, the German Chemical Society, since 1999.

https://www.chemeurope.com/en/news/1182931/association-of-chemists-honors-young-researcher-from-likat.html