Current Organocatalysis

Prof. Chittaranjan Sinha by birth is an Indian, and is now serving as Professor of Chemistry at Jadavpur University (2nd in All India University Rank and 10th in All Indian Universities, Research Institutes, IITs, IISERs, etc.). Previously, he served at Vidyasagar University and at Burdwan University. Prof. Sinha was awarded Best Chemistry Teacher by Association of Chemistry Teachers, and he has visited countries in Europe, as well as Japan, Singapore, and Taiwan, in different capacities. So far, he has published more than 320 highly cited original research papers in Chemical Sciences, secured Scopus h-index of 36 and citations of 4,475. In addition, he has enjoyed 21 government-funded research projects.

Dr. Varma obtained his Ph.D. from Delhi University in 1976. After postdoctoral positions at Robert Robinson Laboratories, University of Liverpool, UK, he was a faculty member at Baylor College of Medicine, Senior Scientist at Houston Advanced Research Center, and Research Professor at Sam Houston State University prior to joining as senior scientist in the Sustainable Technology Division at US Environmental Protection Agency in 1999. He has over 40 years of research experience in management of multi-disciplinary technical programs ranging sustainable nanomaterials to development of eco-friendly synthetic methods using microwaves, ultrasound and mechanochemical mixing. He has published over 450 scientific papers, awarded 15 US Patents, 7 books, 27 book chapters and 3 encyclopedia contributions with (H-Index 89) and total citations ~ 25,000.

Dr. Alves received his B.S. (2002), Master (2004) and PhD (2008) degrees at Federal University of Santa Maria (Brazil) and in 2008 he worked at University of São Paulo (Brazil) as a postdoctoral fellow. After that, he holds a position of Adjunct Professor at Federal University of Pelotas, Brazil. The achievements throughout his short academic career should be highlighted, in both teaching and research spheres. Dr. Alves has co-authored more than 130 papers and 15 patents showing the high level of his independent work, which involves the development of efficient, green procedures to prepare organochalcogen compounds with biological activities. The use of atom-efficient reactions (click-chemistry), transition-metal catalysis, organocatalysis and green solvents are among the protocols developed by Dr. Alves.

He is an Associate Professor of Organic Chemistry at the Federal University of Juiz de Fora (UFJF), Brazil. His PhD was conducted at University of Campinas (UNICAMP) where he worked for Prof. Fernando Coelho. In 2009, he spent a year at the University of California at Berkeley – USA as a Post-doc in the research group of Prof. F. Dean Toste involving with asymmetric gold catalysis. In 2017, He received a Young Authors Award from the Brazilian Chemical Society. His research interesting is focused in the development of new catalytic methodologies.

Dr. Brahmachari presently holds the position of full professor of chemistry at Visva-Bharati (a Central University), India. He received Ph.D. (Organic Chemistry) in 1997 from the same University and joined his alma mater as assistant professor in 1998. He has about 18 years of experience in both teaching and research at the University level. He has supervised several PhD students so far, and produced nearly 160 scientific publications including original research papers, review articles, books and invited book chapters in the fields of natural products and green chemistry. He has authored/edited 17 books and more than 30 book chapters so far published by internationally reputed major presses. He is the Series Editor of the Elsevier Book Series ‘Natural Product Drug Discovery’, and Editor-in-Chief of Signpost Open Access journal of Organic & Biomolecular Chemistry (ISBN: 2321-4163). Prof. Brahmachari is a Who’s Who in the World-2015 & 2016 Listee, and also a recipient of Academic Brilliance Award-2015 (Excellence in Research).

Dr. D.I.Brahmbhatt is Head(Ex.) and Professor of Organic Chemistry at Department of Chemistry, Sardar Patel University, Gujarat, India. He has 37 years of research and teaching experience. His research area is organometalic reaction, organic synthesis especially oxygen and nitrogen heterocycles, microwave assisted organic synthesis and synthesis of natural products. He has produced 22 Ph.D. students and published more than 60 research papers. He has remained as a chairman of board of studies in Chemistry, coordinator of UGC - CEAP(Center of Excellence in Applied Polymers) programme at S.P.University and member on board of CAS (Center for Advanced Study) programme at Department of Chemistry, S.P.University and acted as a committee member in different committees at Sardar Patel University.

Maria Annunziata M. Capozzi received in 1999 the “Laurea in Chemistry” and in 2003 the PhD in Chemical Sciences at the University of Bari. In 2001 moved to the Faculty of Agriculture, University of Foggia as assistant professor of Organic Chemistry. In January 2012 assumed her present position of assistant professor of Organic Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry, University of Bari. Began, in 1999, working on asymmetric synthesis of sulfoxides. Her current research interests focus on the synthetic organic chemistry and mechanistic aspects. Furthermore, work on new synthetic methodologies for the preparation by asymmetric synthesis, enantioselective catalysis, organometallic chemistry.

Prof. Correia obtained his PhD degree from Stanford University, USA. He started his independent career at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. He then moved to the State University of Campinas (Unicamp), Brazil, where he is currently full professor. He acted as head of Graduate Studies Committee, and as vice-director of the Institute for the period 2009 – 2010. Prof. Correia is the recipient of the 3M "Non-Tenured Faculty Award", and the “Unicamp Zeferino Vaz Excellence Award”. He has published more than 100 papers and is named inventor of 8 patents. His main research interests are in homogeneous metal-catalyzed reactions, ligand design, and development of new synthetic methodologies.

Dr. Wei-Lin Dai is a faculty member and professor of chemistry in Fudan University (P.R. China) where he teaches experimental physical chemistry and some courses for graduate students. He has nearly 20 years of experience in the research and development of new catalysts and processes in catalysis and green chemistry. During his career at Fudan Univ., Dr. Wei-Lin Dai holds a Ph.D. in physical chemistry from Fudan Univ.. Notably, he has authored more than 250 peer-reviewed articles, 25 patents, and three chapters of academic books.

Dr. Fatih Doğan obtained his Ph.D. degree (2007) in Chemistry from Ege University, Izmir, Turkey. Dr. Doğan is currently working as Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemistry (Faculty of Education) at Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University, Çanakkale, Turkey. His skills and expertise mainly lie in the subject areas of Material Characterization, Nanomaterials, Polymers, Polymeric Materials, Polymer Science, Polymer Synthesis, Thermal Analysis, DSC, TGA, Thermal Properties, Polymer Processing, Thermogravimetric Analysis, Polymer Technology, Differential Thermal Analysis, Thermogravimetry, etc. Dr. Doğan, as an author/co-author, has published more than 210 articles in various journals, having a significant number of total citations, i.e. over 5,555.

Dr. Dutta is a Chief Scientist (Retd.), Materials Science and Technology Division, CSIR-North-East Institute of Science and Technology (NEIST), Jorhat 785006, Assam, India. He has nearly 32 years of research experience in the area of chemical sciences relating to synthesis of metal complexes, homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis, nanoparticles of metals etc, Dr. Dutta has published more than 90 research papers in sci journals, 45 patents, 6 book chapters, guided 15 Ph.D. students. He received several awards for his R&D achievements.

Dr. El-Newehy, Associate Professor at King Saud University Saudi Arabia, and at Tanta University, Egypt. He has almost 21 years of academic experience. He was a visiting professor at Donghua University, China and at Chonbuk National University, Korea. He was a Postdoc at Yamagata University, Japan, and ICS-UNIDO Fellow, at University of Pisa, Italy. He was a research scholar at Virginia Commonwealth University, USA. He has more than 100 publications (h-index 23), 2 books and 4 chapters. He is a reviewer of scientific journals. His research interests focused on polymer synthesis and applications, controlled-release, electrospinning, and fuel cells.

Dr. Gutierrez is a Professor at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. He has more than 20 years of teaching experience and currently teaches several courses in Organic Chemistry. His research interests are catalysis and the synthesis of organic materials with potential applications in electronics. Dr. Gutierrez has authored more than 30 scientific papers, 2 patents, and 3 book chapters. He was the recipient of the 2015 University of Texas Regents’ Outstanding Teaching Award.

Dr. He obtained a doctorate in Chemistry from Nankai University. Currently Dr. He is a Professor of Chemistry at Nankai University, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry. Prof. He has authored over 190 scientific publications and held 21 patents. He edited 12 books and chapters (ACS book series, John Wiley & Sons, Springer, Elsevier，CRC Press Taylor @ Francis), delivered more than 60 invited lectures at international conferences. He is a Series Editor of “Green Chemistry and Sustainable Technology”, editor-in chief of “Current Organic Synthesis” and on the editorial board of a dozen of international scientific journals.

Dr. R. Karvembu is working as Associate Professor in the Department of Chemistry at National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirappalli, India. His areas of interest are Catalysis and Organometallics. He has obtained Ph.D. from Bharathiar University, India and subsequently carried out post doctoral research at Pohang University of Science and Technology, South Korea. He has authored more than 100 research articles and guided many graduate and master students.

György Keglevich graduated from the Technical University of Budapest in 1981 as a chemical engineer. He became a professor in 1996. He has been the Head of the Department of Organic Chemistry and Technology, Budapest University of Technology and Economics since 1999. He deals with organophosphorus, P-heterocyclic and environmentally friendly chemistry including MW-assisted and catalytic reactions, the development and simplification of catalysts. He is the author or co-author of ca.480 papers and book chapters. He is the member of the Editorial Board of Heteroatom Chem. and Phosphorus,Sulfur, Silicon. He holds different editor responsibilities with Curr. Org. Chem., Curr. Org. Synth., Curr. Green Chem., Lett. Org. Chem. and Lett. Drug Design Disc.

Professor Lee obtained a Bachelor’s degree in Chemistry from the Chinese University of Hong Kong and a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from the University of California, Los Angeles. He did postdoctoral research at the Massachusetts Institution of Technology under the supervision of Prof. Barry Sharpless. Prof. Lee joined Baptist University in 1982 and advanced through the years to Chair Professorship. He was Head of Department of Chemistry for 10 years. His research interests are organic synthesis, analytical science and science education. Prof. Lee is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Hu Li is Professor of Center for R&D of Fine Chemicals, Guizhou University (GZU), China. Dr. Li stayed as a visiting student researcher at Technical University of Denmark and University of Chinese Academy of Sciences prior to obtaining his Ph.D. from GZU. He then worked as a postdoctoral fellow at Nanjing Agricultural University and Tohoku University. His research focuses on the catalytic conversion of renewable resources into chemicals and biofuels with functional catalytic materials. Dr. Li has published more than 10 patents and over 80 peer-reviewed papers on sustainable catalysis and green chemistry. Currently, He is Editorial Board Member of Current Organocatalysis, and Guest Editors of Current Organic Chemistry and International Journal of Chemical Engineering.

He is an Assistant Professor of Chemistry at the Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech), China. He received his PhD in organic chemistry under the supervision of Prof. Xinmiao Liang at Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP), Chinese Academy of Science. Then he moved to The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (2009-2011) and Hong Kong Baptist University (2011) as postdoctoral fellow in Albert Chan's research group involving with asymmetric organocatalysis. His research interesting is focused in the development of new organocatalytic methodologies.

Dr. Debabrata Maiti has obtained M.Sc. in Chemistry from Indian Institute of Technology Bombay and he further got Ph.D. in Chemistry from johns Hopkins, USA. He is presently serving as an Associate Professor at IIT Bombay, Department of Chemistry. He is also an Associate Editor of The Journal of Organic Chemistry and Editorial Advisory Board of Organometallics. He has been recognized with awards and honors such as OPPI - Young Scientist Award, Alkyl Amines - Young Scientist Award, INSA - Young Scientist Award and NASI- Young Scientist Platinum Jubilee Award.

Professor Sivakumar Manickam (Siva) is a Chemical Engineer specializing Process Engineering of Nanomaterials especially Nanopharmaceuticals. Presently he is working with University of Nottingham, Malaysia campus and his research group concentrates on the process development of cavitation based reactors towards technologically important nanomaterials. The group also looking into the development of pharmaceutical nanoemulsions as well as utilizing novel carbon nanomaterials to design biosensor for the earlier detection of cancer and diabetes. He is also the Associate Dean for Research and Knowledge Exchange, Faculty of Engineering and is the Director of the Centre for Nanotechnology and Advanced Materials. He was also the recipient of JSPS fellowship, Japan. He has published ~200 peer reviewed journal and conference papers. He is the Fellow of Higher Education Academy (UK), Fellow of RSC and member of Institute of Nanotechnology (IoN).

Dr. Campos-Martín is Scientific Researcher of CSIC and founding shareholder of Soluciones Cataliticas IBERCAT S. L. He is specialized in the development of novel homogeneous and heterogeneous catalytic processes, with a strong emphasis on the efficient usage of raw materials and energy as well as on the minimal generation of unwanted by-products. In agreement with this objective, my research is focused in immediate technological application. In these studies, a great variety of techniques and experimental methodologies are usually applied, in which it can be pointed out: spectroscopic techniques (UV-Vis, NIR, FTIR, XPS, XANES), thermal analysis (TG, TPR, TPD, TPO), analytical techniques (GC, GC/MS, mass spectrometry), electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction etc. A detailed listing of publications can be obtained at http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7913-9851

Professor Martins got her Chemical Engineering degree (1990), Ph.D. (1996) and Habilitation (2015) from Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon. She is Researcher (Core Member) at Centro de Química Estrutural (Coordination Chemistry and Catalysis Group) of Instituto Superior Técnico, since 1992 and member of the Research Core Team and of the Executive Committee of the PhD programme - Catalysis and Sustainability. She was appointed (1996) as Adjunct Professor at the Chemical Engineering Department of Instituto Superior de Engenharia de Lisboa (ISEL), Polytechnic Institute of Lisbon. She is also the Vice-President of the said Department. Prof. Martins has authored more than 100 manuscripts, 13 patents, and 2 book chapters, and supervised several PhD (12) and Master (14) students. She is also President of the Portuguese Electrochemical Society.

L.O. Got her PhD in Chemical Sciences at the University of Padova, where she is currently Associate Professor. Her research activity is in the theoretical-computational field and deals mainly with the investigation of the structural, electronic and reactivity properties of inorganic and bio-inspired catalysts and functional molecules, aiming at rational design and assessment of structure-reactivity predictions. In her group, accurate mechanistic studies are carried out using state-of-the-art quantum chemistry methods, suitable for systems with few tens of atoms as well as hybrid approaches based on the development of ad hoc force fields, to model systems with hundreds/thousands of atoms.

Musa Özil, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor in the Department of Chemistry at Recep Tayyip Erdogan University in Turkey. His research interests are design, synthesis and biological evaluation of new heterocyclic compounds such as triazole, oxadiazole, thiadiazole, benzimidazole, coumarine… etc. He is the member of the Editorial Board of Current Organocatalysis, Chemistry of Heterocyclic Compounds and Current Microwave Chemistry. He has published over 60 research articles, meeting abstracts, and book chapters.

Teresa M. V. D. Pinho e Melo studied Chemistry at the University of Coimbra, where she obtained the PhD in Organic Chemistry in 1995. She was Research Fellow at the University of Liverpool (1992-1993). She received her Habilitation in Organic Chemistry in 2003. She is currently Director of the Department of Chemistry, Associate Professor with Habilitation and Head of the Organic Chemistry Research Group at the University of Coimbra. She is also President of the Division of Organic Chemistry of the Portuguese Chemical Society. She has published more than 115 peer-reviewed scientific papers in international journals. Her research interests are in the area of synthetic and mechanistic heterocyclic organic chemistry. She is particularly concerned with the development of synthetic routes to new bioactive molecules.

Maddali L. N. Rao obtained Ph.D. in 1996 from the University of Hyderabad, Hyderabad, India. He had carried out post doctoral research in Japan and USA before joining IIT Kanpur in the year 2003. Dr. Rao with more than 20 years of research experience is currently Professor in the Department of Chemistry, IIT Kanpur. He has been actively involved in the development of New Generation Cross-coupling reactions, GREEN Organometallic methods for organic synthesis. His other broad research interests spread across Organic Synthesis, Metal-catalyzed reactions, Organocatalysis, microwave-mediated organic synthesis, organometallics and Green Chemistry.

Dr. Ramon Rios Torres obtained his Ph.D. degree (2000) in Organic Chemistry from University of Barcelona, Spain. Currently, Dr. Rios is Associate Professor in Organic Chemistry at University of Southampton, UK. His skills and expertise mainly lie in the subject areas of Organic Synthesis, Synthetic Organic Chemistry, Heterocyclic Chemistry, Organic Chemistry, Catalysis, Asymmetric Synthesis, Small Molecule Synthesis, Organocatalysis, Organometallic Chemistry, Fluorine Chemistry, Organo Fluorine Chemistry, etc. Dr. Rios, as an author/co-author, has published more than 130 articles in various journals, having a significant number of total citations, i.e. over 5,875.

Dr. Rout, L.D. obtained Ph.D. in 2008 from the IIT Guwahati, Assam, India. He had carried out post doctoral research in USA, Germany and France before joining Berhampur University Odisha in the year 2014. Dr. Rout has more than 13 years of research experience in Synthetic Organic Chemistry, He has been awarded with Alexander-von –Humboldt fellowship and FPGG Fellowship. He has more than 1900 Citation, He has been actively involved in the development of C-H, C-C, C-N, C-S, C-O bond Activation, Organocatalysis, New drug (Anti-malaria and anti-cancer)Discovery, Asymmetric Catalysis for organic synthesis.

G. B. Shul’pin works at N. N. Semenov Institute of Chemical Physics (Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow). He is currently a Leading Scientific Researcher. Shul’pin is a Foreign Corresponding Member of the Academy of Sciences of Lisbon (Portugal). His research activities concern metal complex catalysis, oxidation of hydrocarbons, activation of C–H bond in saturated and aromatic hydrocarbons, organometallic chemistry. Other interests include photocatalysis, biomimetic oxidations and ecological chemistry. He is a member of Editorial Boards of journals “Journal of Organometallic Chemistry”, “Catalysis Communications”, “Catalysts” “Advances in Chemical Engineering and Science”, “Current Organocatalysis”, “American Chemical Science Journal”, “Journal of Engineering”, “The Scientific World Journal (Organic Chemistry)”, “International Journal of Advanced Chemistry Engineering Research”, “Modern Chemistry”, Shul’pin has published more than 250 papers in refereed international and Russian chemical journals, his Hirsch index is 48. He is the author of monographs published in Russian and English: particularly A. E. Shilov, G. B. Shul’pin, “Activation and Catalytic Reactions of Saturated Hydrocarbons in the Presence of Metal Complexes”, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht/Boston/London/Moscow, 2002.

Dr. Venu Srinivas received his Ph.D. degree in 2010 from University of Hyderabad, India. He did his postdoctoral research at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Bombay, India (2011-2012), and then at Gifu University, Japan (2012-2013). Later on, in 2013, he joined as AIST Research Fellow at National Institute of Advanced Industrial Institute of Science and Technology (AIST), Tsukuba, Japan, where he is continuing his research career. His main research interests focus on bio-inspired catalysis, development of metal complexes and their application in the heterogeneous catalysis (using zeolites, MOF) via continuous-flow chemistry on a nano-confined region.

I was born in 16 September 1976, Meymeh, Esfahan state, Iran. I earned my BSc in applied chemistry from the University of Isfahan in 1998, my MSc in organic chemistry from Tarbiat Modarres University in 2000 and my PhD in organic chemistry from Tarbiat Modarres University in 2004. Then, I joined to the University of Zabol as assistant professor in 2004 and as associate professor in 2009. At 2011, joined to Isfahan University of Technology and at 2013 (up to now), I have continued my career in this University as professor.

Dr. Rajesh Viswanathan obtained his Ph.D. degree (2005) in Organic Chemistry of Natural Products and Enzymes from Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA. Dr. Viswanathan is currently working as Frank Hovorka Assistant Professor of Chemistry at Case Western Reserve University (CWRU), Cleveland, OH, USA. His skills and expertise mainly lie in the subject areas of Synthesis, Protein Expression, Synthetic Organic Chemistry, Medicinal and Pharmaceutical Chemistry, Natural Product Chemistry, Nuclear Magnetic Resonance, Heterocyclic Chemistry, Organic Chemistry, Synthetic Medicinal Chemistry, Enzymology, Pharmaceutical Chemistry, Drug Synthesis, etc. Dr. Viswanathan, as an author/co-author, has published more than 30 articles in various journals, having over 505 total citations.

Dr. Linsheng Wang is the pioneer for exploring the Mo/HZSM-5 catalysts for production of benzene and hydrogen directly from methane and the Re / HZSM-5 catalysts for production of benzene and hydrogen from methane with carbon dioxide. He found and developed a new type of Pd-Ag-Ru / α-Al2O3 ternary alloy composite membrane for ultra-pure hydrogen production with durability at higher temperatures. He has successfully fabricated Pt, Ir and Ni-based sub-nano-sized monometallic and bimetallic clusters in the pores as novel efficient catalysts for synthesis of phenol by selective oxidation with molecular oxygen.

Dr. Zhang received his PhD degree in organic chemistry at Nankai University, China.Presently,he is a professor at Hebei Normal Universityand head of a research group for green chemistry. His current research interests are dedicated towards the development of new green solvents, new reagents and catalysts in organic synthesis.He has publishedaround 100 scientific papers with h-index of 44 and total citations about 4400 times.

Dr. Zhao is a professor of Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry (SIOC), Chinese Academy of Sciences., and head of Key Laboratory of Synthetic Chemistry of Natural Substances, Chinese Academy of Sciences. He has about 28 years of experience in the research on the organic chemistry. Dr. Zhao received a Ph. D. in organic Chemistry from SIOC. Dr. Zhao has authored more than 140 manuscripts, 9 patents, and co-editor “Green Organic Catalysis”. His research has been focused on organic catalysis, synthesis of natural products, green chemistry, as well as organoflurine chemistry.

Jian Zhou obtained his PhD in 2004 from Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry, CAS, under the guidance of Prof. Yong Tang. After postdoctoral research with Professor Shū Kobayashi at the University of Tokyo, and Professor Benjamin List at Max-Planck-Institut für Kohlenforschung, he joined East China Normal University as Professor from November 2008. His research interests focus on developing new methodology to construct fully substituted carbon stereocenters. He has received the “Thieme Chemistry Journal Award 2011”. He is now the member of Advisory Board of Acta Chimica Sinica, Organic & Biomolecular Chemistry, Mini-Reviews in Organic Chemistry and Current Organocatalysis.

Dr. Prof. Grigory V. Zyryanov (born 1973) graduated from the Ural Polytechnical Institute in 1995. In 2000, he earned PhD in Organic Chemistry. In 2001–2003, he was doing his post-doctoral studies on calix[4]arenes and supramolecular chemistry of gases with Prof. Dmitry M. Rudkevich (UT Arlington, TX). In 2004, he joined the research group of Prof. Pavel Anzenbacher Jr. (BGSU, OH) where he was working on themolecular recognition and photochemistry.In 2010, he joined the faculty of the Department of Organic and Biomolecular Chemistry (Ural Federal University, Russia). In 2012, he earned a Doctor of Science Degree in Chemistry.

He is an Associate Professor of Inorganic and Nano Chemistry at the Dumlupinar University, Turkey. His PhD was conducted at Middle East Technical University (METU). In 2011, he spent almost two years at Massachusetts Institute and Technology (MIT) – USA as a Post-doc in the research group of Prof. M. S. Strano involving with different nanomaterials and their applications such as biosensors, biofuel cells, thermopower energy generation, carbon nanotubes, graphene etc. He has published over 80 international publications in scientific journals published within the scope of SCI, almost 2000 citations to these publications. He has got many popular research incentive awards.

Dr. Al-Hashimi received his MSci Honours degree in Pharmaceutical Chemistry in 2003 and PhD in 2007 from Queen Mary University of London, UK. In 2007-2008, Dr. Al-Hashimi subsequently worked as a Senior Development Chemist at Evotec OAI, Oxfordshire, UK. In 2008 he joined Imperial College London, UK as a PDRA in the chemistry department. In 2012 he joined Qatar University as an Assistant professor and currently he is a Research Associate Professor at Texas A&M University at Qatar. Al-Hashimi has received several research awards; Donald C. Bradley prize, UK (2003); ASPICC prize, UK (2004); Lefevre prize, UK (2005); Research Fellow Excellence Award at TAMUQ (2015); Research award in the energy and environment Pillar (2016), and ACMME (2016). His research focus on the design and synthesis of organic semiconductor materials for a range of optoelectronic applications. His other interests center on the development of well-defined novel polymeric materials for catalysis.

Dr. Chin Fei Chee obtained his Ph.D. in organic synthesis from the University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Dr. Chee is currently a Senior Lecturer at the same university. He was a senior scientist at Aurigene Discovery Technology, Malaysia, prior to joining this university. He has been actively involved in various research activities especially in the area of organic synthesis and medicinal chemistry. Dr. Chee has published over 40 scientific papers and book chapters, and he is a recipient of many research grants and awards.

Wen Chen is an Associate Professor of chemistry at Yunnan University. He obtained Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Yunnan University in 2014. He has authored more than 20 scientific papers and held 2 patents. He is interested in the total synthesis of bioactive natural products and goal-oriented synthetic methodology. He is also involved to design and synthesize bioactive natural-product-like compounds.

He is an Associate Professor of Organic Chemistry at the Federal University of Viçosa (UFV), Brazil. His PhD was conducted at State University of Campinas (Unicamp), Brazil, where he worked for Profa. Anita J. Marsaioli. Dr. Fernandes has author or co-authored more than 50 papers. His main research interests are in homogeneous and heterogeneous catalyzed reactions, new catalysts, and development of new synthetic methodologies.

Samaresh Jana earned Ph.D. in Chemistry from Indian Association for the Cultivation of Sciences (Jadavpur University, Kolkata), India in 2007. He did postdoctoral work with Prof. Iain Coldham (University of Sheffield, UK) and Prof. Nan Zheng (University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, USA) in the field of Synthetic Organic Chemistry. He served as a Scientist in medicinal chemistry division of GVK Biosciences Pvt. Ltd., India during 2010-2012. Presently, he is associated with the Department of Chemistry, SAS, Kalinga Institute of Industrial Technology (KIIT) as an Associate Professor. He is interested in the synthesis of bioactive natural products and related compounds. He is also involved to develop novel synthetic methodology useful in organic chemistry.

Marta Meazza was born in 1987 in Saronno (Italy). She graduated from the University of Milan in 2012 with a Master Degree in Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Technology, under the supervision of Prof. Egle Beccalli. She obtained her PhD degree under the supervision of Dr Ramon Rios at the University of Southampton (UK) in 2016. After a postdoctoral position in the group of Prof Karl Anker Jørgensen at Aarhus University (DK), in 2017 she moved to the University of Southampton as a Research Fellow. Her research interests include synergistic, organocatalysis, organometallic chemistry, organocatalytic photoactivation of organic compounds, heterogeneous catalysis.

Sara Meninno is a PostDoctoral fellow at University of Salerno (Italy). She obtained her Ph.D. in Chemistry in 2015 from University of Salerno under the supervision of Prof. A. Lattanzi. She was awarded by Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei a Royal Society of Chemistry fellowship for Italian researchers to spend a research period in United Kingdom. She joined the group of Dr. Ramon Rios at Southampton University (UK). Dr. Meninno has co-authored more than 20 papers. His main research interests are in organocatalysis, in developlment of new asymmetric tandem and one-pot methodologies for the construction of chiral compounds.