On December 11^th, Prof. Dr. Benjamin List, managing director of the Max-Planck-InstitutfürKohlenforschung,visited our campus. Student invited seminar is the highest-level seminar series in our school.Prof. List, who obtained the most votes from all the students, was invited as the distinguished guest to deliver a lecture at E-104.

 

  The lecture focused on the frontier& hotresearch area: Asymmetric Counteranion-Directed Catalysis (ACDC). As a pioneer in this field,his research group has carried out extensive studies in this area. Due to his efforts, the widespread use of this concept in organocatalysis, transition metal catalysis, and Lewis acid catalysis has been demonstrated in the past decade.

    Prof. Benjamin List was born in Frankfurt in 1968. He attended Free University of Berlin for his undergraduate studies and obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Frankfurt in 1997. He subsequently joined the Scripps Research Instituteas a Postdoc and started his academic career as assistant professor there. In 2003, he moved to Max-Planck-InstitutfürKohlenforschung and currently he is the managing director there.
    Benjamin List’s research focuses on organic synthesis and catalysis. He has contributed and pioneered fundamental concepts in organocatalysis, including aminocatalysis, enamine catalysis, and asymmetriccounteranion-directed catalysis (ACDC). He discovered the first proline-catalyzed direct intermolecular aldol reaction in 2000. His latest work deals with chiral anions in asymmetric catalysis. Due to his great contributions, Prof. List received numerous awards including the Cope Scholar Award, Horst-Pracejus-PreisAward,Mukaiyama Award, Otto-Bayer-Prize, the Cari-Duisberg-Memorial Award, etc.