Invited seminar
Author: Prof. José Luis Mascareñas
Affiliation: CIQUS and Departamento de Química Orgánica. Universidade de Santiago de Compostela
When: Friday, June 16, 2023 - 11:30 to 13:00
Where: Saló d'actes, Escola Superior de Tecnologia TD0301CC
Presented by: Prof. Beatriu Escuder
Abstract: 

Transition metal complexes have found widespread utility in a variety of scientific fields, ranging from catalysis to photophysics and supramolecular chemistry. The different coordination and redox characteristics of metals, together with the possibility of tuning their properties by changing the nature of the ligands, provides innumerable possibilities for generating new reactivities, and for implementing physicochemical responses. Building upon these characteristics, most of our work deals with the application of transition metal complexes in the field of catalysis, biosupramolecular chemistry and chemical biology. Our work in catalysis has been mostly focused on the discovery of new annulation reactions,1 while in supramolecular chemistry our work has been mainly centered in the field of DNA recognition.2 More recently, we aimed to merge our knowledge in metal catalysis with our work in biomolecular chemistry and chemical biology. We have investigated the viability of translating organometallic catalysis to biological media, and even to living cells.3 While this represents a considerable challenge, owing to the presumed water and air incompatibility of many metal catalyzed reactions and the requirement of orthogonality and biocompatibility, we have developed several intracellular palladium, ruthenium and gold-promoted reactions. 4 References [1] (a) Mascareñas, J. L.; Varela, I.; López, F; Acc. Chem. Res. 2019, 52, 465. (b) Gulías, M.; Mascareñas, J. L. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2016, 55, 11000. (c) X. Vidal, J. L. Mascareñas, M. Gulías, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2019, 141, 1862. (d) Fernández, D; Mascareñas, J. L.; López, F. Chem. Soc. Rev. 2020, 49, 7378. [2] (a) Rodríguez, J.; Learte, S.; Mosquera, Celaya, J. C; Rodríguez-Larrea, D.; Vázquez, M. E. ; Mascareñas, J. L. Chem. Sci. 2018, 9, 4118. (b) Learte, S.; Curado, N.; Rodríguez, J.; Vázquez, M. E.; Mascareñas, J. L. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2017, 139, 16188. (c) Rodriguez, J.; Mosquera, J.; Learte-Aymamı́, S. Vázquez, M. E.; Mascareñas, J. L. Acc. Chem. Res. 2020, 53, 2286. [3] (a) Vidal, C.; Tomás-Gamasa, M.; Destito, P.; López, F.; Mascareñas, J. L. Nature Commun. 2018, 9, 1913. (b) Gutierrez, S.; Tomas-Gamasa, M.; Mascareñas, J. L. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2021, 60, 22017. [4] For reviews, see: (a) Martínez-Calvo, M.; Mascareñas, J. L. Coord. Chem. Rev. 2018, 359, 57. (b) Destito, P. Vidal, C., López, F., Mascareñas, J. L. Chem. Eur. J. 2021 27, 4789.

Biography: 
Biographical sketch http://metbiocat.eu/members José Luis Mascareñas is full Professor in Chemistry at the University of Santiago de Compostela (USC, Galicia, Spain) since 2005, and scientific director of the Center for research in biological chemistry and molecular materials (CiQUS) since 2014. He completed his PhD at the University of Santiago in 1988, and was a postdoctoral fellow at Stanford University (USA, 1989-1991). He has been visiting scholar in Harvard University (USA) in the summers of 1992 and 1995, and visiting scientist in the University of Cambridge (UK, 2009) and the MIT (USA, 2013). He has supervised 42 PhD theses, published over 215 articles in peer reviewed journals and wrote 23 patent applications. Some awards: Organic Chemistry award of the Spanish Royal Society of Chemistry (RSEQ, 2009), Advanced grant of the ERC (2014), Galician of the year "Grupo Correo Gallego" (2014), Gold medal of the University of Santiago (2014), Gold Medal of the Spanish Royal Society of Chemistry (2015), award of the Galicia Critic (2018), Research Medal of the Royal Galician Academy of Sciences (2019), Proof-of-Concept grant of the ERC (2020), member of the European Academy of sciences (EURASC, since 2017), founder/first president of the Spanish group of Chemical Biology of the RSEQ and, since 2021, vicepresident of the RSEQ.