CENTC Research Highlighted on Cover of Angewandte Chemie International Edition

A paper by CENTC investigator Melanie Sanford and coworkers is featured on the back cover of this week’s issue of Angewandte Chemie International Edition. The paper, “Remarkably High Reactivity of Pd(OAc)2/Pyridine Catalysts: Nondirected C-H Oxygenation of Arenes”, describes a new catalyst developed by the CENTC electrophilic oxidation team that shows excellent reactivity in the C-H oxygenation of simple aromatic substances. The Pd/pyridine ratio is critical to both reactivity and site selectivity.

The cover art was designed by Dr. Marion Emmert, now Assistant Professor of Chemistry at Worcester Polytechnic Institute.  Read the paper on the journal website.

Melanie Sanford receives MacArthur "Genius" Award

Photo courtesy the John D.
& Catherine T. MacArthur
Foundation.

CENTC investigator Melanie Sanford has been named a recipient of the 2011 John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, otherwise known as the Genius Award. The MacArthur Fellows Program awards unrestricted $500,000 fellowships to talented individuals who have shown extraordinary originality and dedication in their creative pursuits and a marked capacity for self-direction. The award cites Melanie's work “reviving and enhancing approaches to organic synthesis previously set aside because of their technical difficulty”.

Melanie is Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Chemistry at the University of Michigan. Read more about the MacArthur Fellows Program and the full citation of Melanie's award.

Thomas Lyons Awarded NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship

CENTC postdoctoral researcher Dr. Thomas Lyons has been awarded an American Competiveness in Chemistry Fellowship (ACC-F) from the National Science Foundation. The ACC-F program seeks to build ties between academic, industrial, national laboratory, and NSF center researchers, and also involves beginning scientist in efforts to broaden participation in chemistry. Dr. Lyons received his B.S. in Chemistry from DePaul University in 2005 and earned his Ph.D. in 2010 from the University of Michigan working with Melanie Sanford. He is now a postdoctoral fellow at the University of North Carolina with Prof. Maurice Brookhart. This fellowship will support Tom's research on new transition metal-containing catalysts for transfer dehydrogenation of alkanes, which is carried out in collaboration with scientists at Eastman Chemical.