Registration is open for (HRSMC) Activities Calendar Tulip VI Modern Developments in Spectroscopy Events HRSMC Lustrum Symposium PhMIC Course January 29-Februay 6, 2015 This year’s Annual Symposium hosted special keynote speakers. We were very honoured to welcome three Nobel Laureates, prof. Introduction for new PhD’s Roald Hoffmann (1981) (Cornell University), prof. Arieh Warshel (2013) (University of Southern California) en prof. W.E. Moerner TULIP Summer School (2014) (Stanford University) as well as the renowned prof. Erick April 14-17 April 2015 Carreira (ETH Zürich) to celebrate this milestone with us. Last Confirmed speakers are: but not least, we were also very happy and impressed with our Prof. Paul Corkum, National own HRSMC staff members and PhD students, who gave either a Research Council-Canada, lecture or presented a poster at this symposium. University of Ottawa, Canada Prof. John Doyle, Harvard University, USA Prof. Kjeld Eikema, Vrije Uni- versiteit Amsterdam Prof. Jörg Enderlein, Univer- stät Göttingen, Germany Prof. Martina Havenith, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany Prof. David Nesbitt, Universi- ty of Colorado, Boulder, USA PhD Defenses January 27, 2015 UvA B. van den Bosch “Complexes for electro-and This festive edition of the Annual Symposium took place at the photocatalytic proton reduc- heart of the Dutch Scientific Community, the Trippenhuis, home tion” of the Dutch Science Academy. Promotor Pictures can be found here Prof. J.N.H. Reek Co-supervisor Prof. S. Wout- Dick Stufkens Prijs 2014 Awarded to Tjøstil Vlaar ersen The 2014 Dick Stufkens January 29, 2015 Prijs was awarded to VU Dr Tjøstil Vlaar for his thesis A. Mirtschink “Isocyanides’ Latest Trick: Pal- “Energy Density” ladium-Catalyzed Imidoylative Promotor Cross-Coupling Reactions”. Prof. E.J. Baerends The prize was handed to Tjøstil Co-supervisor Vlaar during the Lustrum Prof. P. Gori-Giorgi Symposium, by Prof. Hans de Vries, chairman of the Jury. In his very succesful PhD re- search project Vlaar developed new reactions for the preparation of heterocyclic molecules that could form the basis for new drugs. Read more Other (HRSMC) News and Activities New PhD Students Tulip VI, Modern Developments in Spectroscopy, Group Rothenberg April 14-17, 2015 Yuan (Ana) Gao September 1, 2014 For the sixth time in a row the HRSMC organises this “summer” CSC PhD fellow school with renowned speakers: Prof. Paul Corkum (National Her research topic is “Multi- Research Council-Canada, University of Ottawa, Canada), Prof. functional microporous materi- als”; Supervisors: Dr. Stefania John Doyle (Harvard University, USA), Prof. Kjeld Eikema (Vrije Grecea and Prof. Gadi Rothen- Universiteit Amsterdam), Prof. Jörg Enderlein (Universität berg Göttingen, Germany), Prof. Martina Havenith (Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany) and Prof. David Nesbitt (University of Colo- Group Buma/Brouwer rado, Boulder, USA). DongDong Zheng Read more and register September 1, 2014. The mechanism of chemical re- Molsim2015 was very successful actions. Topics of study will be organocatalysis and molecular With 20 local Masterstudents and 50 Students from all over the machines. world, outside of the Leiden/UvA/VU collaboration the course Promotor Prof. Fred Brouwer was filled as usual to maximum capacity. Benjamin Strudwick started August 1, 2014 on the project “Optically Amplified Vibrational Circular Dichroism: boosting the difference between left and right”. Promotor: Prof. W.J. Buma Co-supervisor: Prof. S. Wout- ersen Yu Zhang and Bruno Martins both started November 1, 2014. They are employed at the UvA, but will work in the Advanced Two weeks of lectures and (computer) excercises, a posterses- Research Center for Nanoli- sion and a social event were organised. thography. Their research will For Pictures see be directed at understanding the fundamental chemistry of Succes for Amsterdam Center for Multiscale Modeling in com- photoresist materials under putational sciences call illumination with Extreme Ul- Three collaborative UvA/VU proposals selected traviolet light. Promotor Prof. Fred Brouwer Three proposals of chemistry researchers from the Amsterdam Universities were selected for the final matching phase of the Group Bouwman ‘Computational Sciences for Energy Research’ public-private partnership, a multi-million euro research initiative of Shell, Silvia D’Agostini the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research NWO and December 1, 2014. Her research topic will be: the Foundation for Fundamental Research on Matter (FOM). “Functional mimics of cy- The successful call demonstrates the strength of the collabora- tochrome c oxidase for re- tive research of the Amsterdam science faculties, a collaboration duction of dioxygen and the pioneered by the joint Amsterdam Center for Multiscale Modeling oxidation of water” (ACMM). The projects will be executed within the ACMM. Two of Supervisor: Dennis Hettersc- them were proposed by researchers Bernd Ensing and Evert heid. Jan Meijer, respectively, both of the University of Amster dam (UvA) and ACMM. In the third project Koop Lammertsma and Matthias Bickelhaupt, both of VU University and ACMM, will collaborate with Wybren Jan Buma of the UvA Molecular Anja Busemann Photonics research group. The projects will add to an earlier December 8, 2014. successful CSER call in which an ACMM proposal by Peter Bol- “In vitro interaction of ruthe- huis (UvA) and Pieter-Rein ten Wolde (VU/AMOLF) was granted. nium-based metallodrugs and proteins” Read more Supervisor: Sylvestre Bonnet. Koop Lammertsma, Chris Slootweg and Andreas Ehlers have Group Groenen/Orrit published two reports on sustainable phosphorus chemistry in Biswajit Pradhan Angewandte Chemie. Februari 1, 2014: Angewandte Chemie 2014, 53, 9068-9071 Redox potential probing in live cells (co-promotoren: T. Aarts- Angewandte Chemie 2014, DOI: 10.1002/anie.201405879 ma, G. Canters, M. Orrit) Weichun Zhang, July 1, 2014 First measurement of chemical fingerprint of smallest ar- Fluorescence enhancement by omatic molecule single gold nanorods Lammertsma/Orru “Laboratory gas-phase de- John Braun and Jordy Saya tection of the cyclopropenyl November 11/December 1, 2014 cation (c-C3H3+)”, Dong- on feng Zhao, Kirstin D. Doney, “One-pot Cascade Syntheses Harold Linnartz, (2014) using Multicomponent Reactions The Astrophysical Jour- and Biocatalysis”. (TOP Grant) nal Letters 791, L28. DOI: The research wil focus on the 10.1088/2041-8205/791/2/ desymmetrization of advanced L28 molecular building blocks using bio, organo- and transition met- or read al catalysis, with the ultimate goal of applying these methods in robust synthesis of complex Group Koper organic molecules such as bioac- tive natural products. Electrochemistry of Nanoparticles in Angewandte Chemie Read More Group Baerends/Bickel- haupt/Visscher A review published together with the group of Patrick Unwin: Read more Francesco Zaccaria started 1.9.2014 on Special issue of PCCP on Electrocatalysis with Perspective on “Artificial supramolecular aggre- gates” Gold Electrocatalysis The research will focus on Read More computational design of self-as- sembling monomers for supra- Awards molecular aggregates to gen- erate functional structures and EchoStip grant for Dennis Hetterscheid materials for electronic, catalytic Dennis Hetterscheid has received an EchoStip grant from the and biomedical applications. The Netherlands Organization of Scientific Research (NWO) for one overall purpose is to develop PhD student. a physical model that provides guiding principles for rationally designing self-assembling mon- Appointments: omers. Moniek Tromp started September 1, 2014 in a Tenure Track po- sition on Sustainable Chemistry. M.A. (Tati) Fernandez-Ibanes started January 1, 2015 on a NWO Vidi grant on “New Stragegies to sustainable procedures based on metal-catalyzed C-H functionalization” PhD Platform Francesco Zaccaria started as new member of the PhD Plat- form. We are looking for new members to join him. Please send an email to [email protected] Social Event for all PhD and Postdocs After the HRSMC lustrum symposium it was up to the PhD stu- dents and post-docs to see if they could withstand the cruel and dark history of the city of Amsterdam. Luckily we can conclude everybody survived this experience, and the Amsterdam Dun- geon turned out to be a great success. Afterwards, the great sto- ries created at the dungeon were widely discussed at the beer factory. At the beer factory, everybody was able to pick and pre- pare their own draught beer. Mix that with bags of peanuts and some appetizers and you got a perfect situation for a nice end- ing of a wonderful HRSMC symposium. All the members of the PhD platform thank everybody for their participation in this so- cial event and their contribution to this rememberable afternoon! See more pictures by Sven Askes and Jaap Borger.