The Research Group at IST, Lisboa (Portugal)

 

The Lisbon group participating in the AQUACHEM project pertains to the “Coordination Chemistry and Molecular Electrochemistry” research line, within the Centro de Química Estrutural research centre of the Instituto Superior Técnico. The group consists of the following permanent staff:

• Armando J.L. Pombeiro (Full Professor, team leader)
• M. Fátima C. Guedes da Silva (Associate Professor)
• Luísa R. Martins (Adj. Professor)
• Adília Charmier (Associate Professor)

The group currently further comprises:

• Vadim Kukushkin (Full Professor, Invited Visiting Scientist from St. Petersburg State University with whom a very fruitful cooperation has been established);

The following Post-doc. fellows:

Dima Garnovskii, Maxim Kuznetsov, Maximilian Kopylovich, Nadejda Bokatch, Ana Venâncio (Assistant), Patrícia Reis;

The following D. Phil. students:

Sílvia Almeida, Sónia Cunha, Natércia Martins, Elisabete Alegria (Assistant), Konstantin Luzyanin, Alexander Kirillov, Marina Kirillova; 

Short term visitors from various countries (Russia, Poland, Austria, Spain, Italy, Germany) are also frequently hosted.

The main research areas are:

i)    Activation, by transition metal centres, of small molecules with biological environmental, pharmacological or industrial significance (nitriles, cyanamides, oximes, oxadiazolines, carboxamides, amidines, alkanes, alkynes, phosphaalkynes, isonitriles, olefins, nitric oxide, dinitrogen, diazo compounds, azides, cyanates, dihydrogen, etc.) namely searching for mimetic systems of biological processes, alternatives for industrial processes and new types of molecular activation with a possible significance in the fine chemistry.

ii)    Molecular electrochemistry of coordination and organic compounds, namely towards applications in electrosynthesis, electrocatalysis and in mechanistic studies, as well as in the establishment of potential-structure relationships, and in the induction of chemical reactivity by electron transfer.