Congratulations to Charlotte Hollingworth who won the Kosterlitz Prize for the best Medicinal/Bioorganic Communication at the 11th Annual RSC Fluorine Subject Group postgraduate meeting. The meeting took place at the University of Aberdeen on 8-9 September 2011.

Congratulations to Patrick who was awarded a GSK award for his Organic Chemistry Part II project.

Congratulations to Véronique who is the recipient of the 2011 Liebig Lectureship Award of the Organic Division of the German Chemical Society. The Liebig lecturer is invited to visit several German Universities and Institutes for talks. Véronique will lecture on the theme "Fabulous Fluorine".

Véronique has recently been selected as a 2011 Distinguished Woman in Chemistry as part of the ACS Challenge Grant-International Year of Chemistry Celebration. This award acknowledges and promotes the work of women chemists and chemical engineers worldwide. Véronique will attend a special ceremony during the IUPAC World Congress to be held in Puerto Rico on Tuesday, August 2, 2011.

We say good bye to Rodrigue after his two years in the group. Rodrigue was working on the 18F-radiolabeling of compounds for PET imaging.

Congratulations to Laurence and Sophie as their paper in OBC on "The Traceless Staudinger Ligation for Indirect 18F-Radiolabelling" is selected as a hot paper. http://blogs.rsc.org/ob/2010/11/29/introducing-18f-in-amino-acids/

The work of Romain Bejot has been ranked as 14th hottest article in the category of Nuclear Medicine and Biology by SciVerse Sciencedirect for the months April to June 2010. Congratulations Romain!

The work of Harriet Teare on labelled Selectfluor is also discussed in an article appearing in Chemistry World. The article is entitled "A better way to add radioactive fluorine".

The work of Harriet Teare is currently highlighted as a Hot Article in Angewandte Chemie. Working in collaboration with GE HC, Prof. G. Sandford and Prof. O. Solin, she has synthesized 18F-labelled Selectfluor. This is of significance since this new labelled reagent has great potential for the preparation of 18F-labelled radiotracers. Congratulations Harriet!

Congratulations to Yee Hwee Lim who recently passed her viva. She has secured a position as a research assistant at the Chemical Synthesis Laboratory, Biopolis, under the direction of Prof. K. C. Nicolaou and Dr David Chen (A* STAR Singapore).

Congratulations to Laurence and Rebekka whose recent Chem Comm publication has been featured on the front cover. The paper investigates the radiosyntheses of 18F-labelled functionalised bis(thiosemicarbazonato) Cu-complexes to be used in positron emission tomography.

Congratulations to Laurence who passed his viva. Laurence has recently taken up a post-doctoral position with Professor Eric O. Aboagye at Imperial Collge, London.

Véronique is currently a visiting professor at the University of Paris XI May-June 2010

Congratulations to James who passed his viva. James has recently taken up a post-doctoral position with David McMillan at Princeton University.

Congratulations to Jonathan who attended the regional SCI Undergraduate Symposium on 24th March 2010 and was awarded a prize for the best presentation.

Congratulations to Véronique who recently published her 100th paper

Congratulations to José who passed his viva. José has recently taken up a post-doctoral position with Prof. Antonio M. Echavarren at the Institute of Chemical Research of Catalonia.

Véronique received the Thieme Journal Award for 2010

Congratulations to Harriet who passed her viva. Harriet is now working for the RSC in Cambridge.

Our recent paper published in Angewandte Chemie International Edition (Electrophilic Fluorocyclization of Allyl Silanes by S. C. Wilkinson et al. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2009, 48, 7083-7086) has been highlighted in SYNFACTS (Issue 11/ volume 2009).

Our recent paper published in Synlett (Phosphine-Catalysed Cyclisation of b-Hydroxy-a,a,Difluoroynones by M. Schuler et al. Synlett, 2009, 11, 1733-1736) has been highlighted in SYNFACTS (Issue 9/ p 964).

Lei Li was awarded a prize sponsored by OBC for the best Poster Presentation at the 9th RSC Fluorine Meeting held in Southampton on 17-18 September 2009.

August
2009

Congratulations to Sue who passed her viva. Sue is now working for Wiley in the city of Weinheim in Germany.

Congratulations to Colin who passed his viva. Colin is now a postdoctoral researcher under the guidance of Professor Kendall Houk at the School of Chemistry at the University of California (UCLA, USA).

Véronique has been appointed Vice-President of the RSC Organic Division, beginning in July 2009: http://www.rsc.org/Membership/Networking/InterestGroups/OrganicDivision/ExecutiveCommittee.asp

Our recent paper published in Angewandte (Enantioselective Synthesis of P-Stereogenic Phosphinates and Phosphine Oxides by Mo-Catalyzed Asymmetric Ring-Closing Metathesis by J. Harvey et al. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2009, 48, 762) has been highlighted in SYNFACTS (Issue 4/ p 397).

Véronique's Author Profile has been published in Angewandte Chemie International Addition To know more about her, see: here

Our recent paper published in Angewandte (Fluorous Synthesis of 18F-Radiotracers with [18F] Fluoride ion: Nucleophilic Fluorination as the Detagging Process by R. Bejot et al. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2009, 48, 586 - Cover story) has been chosen to be discussed in the Journal club Section in Nature (Vol 457/ 29 January 2009 p 515). Discuss this paper here. This paper was also discussed at two occasions on "F-Blog All Things Fluorous" at the following two addresses:
http://www.fluorous.com/journal/?p=579
http://www.fluorous.com/journal/?p=623

Recent work conducted by Dr Romain Bejot and Laurence Carroll in the Gouverneur group has been published in Angewandte Chemie and highlighted by the Editor as the Cover Story (The cover illustration was produced by Dr. Karl Harrison). In their Communication, the group reports the radiosynthesis of various prosthetic groups and 18F radiotracers from fluorous-tagged precursors.

Laurence was awarded a runner-up prize for his poster at the Pfizer Organic Chemistry Symposium.

Guy Giuffredi was awarded a Lilly Prize for Excellence in Organic Chemistry Research for his PRS Transfer report. Matthew Hopkinson was also given a commendation for his PRS transfer report.

The paper of Marie has been selected by the Editor of Angewandte Chemie for illustration as an Inside Cover. Gold(I) catalysts teamed with Selectfluor produce trifluorinated dihydropyranones from difluoroynones under mild conditions. The process proceeds via a vinylgold intermediate that undergoes fluorination and competing protonation. This gold chemistry is encouraging for the synthesis of architecturally complex fluorinated targets combining fluorinated precursors with electrophilic fluorinating reagents.

Congratulations to Sophie who passed her viva. Sophie is currently a postdoctoral research fellow working under the guidance of Professor Guy Lloyd-Jones at the School of Chemistry at the University of Bristol.

Sue was awarded the runner-up prize for the oral presentation she delivered at the Postgraduate Syngenta Meeting held at Jeallot’s Hill on September 11-12, 2008. Her lecture was titled "The Synthesis of Mono-fluorinated and Trifluoromethylated Heterocycles".

Sophie was awarded a prize sponsored by AstraZeneca for the best "Oral Communication" at the 8th RSC Fluorine Meeting held in Newcastle on 11-12 September 2008. Her lecture was titled "Fluorous synthesis of allylic fluorides: C-F bond formation as the detagging process"

Laurence will be presenting his work at the Oxford Biomedical Imaging Festival at St. John's College, September 16th.

Harriet, Colin, Sophie, Jose, Marie, Lorraine and Laurence will all be presenting work at the 8th RSC Fluorine Group Meeting in Newcastle, September 11-12.

The Chemistry Department is delighted to announce that the Vice-Chancellor has conferred the title of Professor on Véronique Gouverneur with immediate effect.

Véronique Gouverneur has received the RSC Bader Award 2008 for her important contribution to synthetic organofluorine chemistry. This Award was founded by an endowment from Dr Alfred Bader to recognise eminence in organic chemistry.

Romain will be presenting work at the 55th Annual SNM Conference in New Orleans from June 14-18.

The work of Sophie, a D Phil student from our group, is currently a Hot Article in Chemical Communications. In collaboration with AstraZeneca, the authors have validated a new fluorous detagging process featuring a C-F bond forming event. The resulting fluorinated products were sucessfully separated from the excess fluorous starting allylsilanes and other fluorous material by Fluorous Solid Phase Extraction. The significance of this transformation is its potential for the preparation of 18F-labelled radiotracers.

The group's recent research paper in OBC (work of Laurence Carroll and Samantha McCullough in collaboration with Tom Rees from the Claridge group) appeared on the front cover of issue 10. The cover shows that propargylic fluorides can be accessed in high enantiomeric purity by fluorodesilylation of allenylsilanes. The chemistry solves the problem of erosion of ee occasionally observed upon nucleophilic fluorination of propargylic alcohols using DAST. The ee were determined using 13C NMR spectroscopy in chiral liquid crystalline solvents (PBLG) with chloroform.

The tutorial review titled 'Fluorine in Medicinal Chemistry' from Sophia has been selected as a Hot Paper by Chemical Society Reviews. It is also in the top 10 most accessed articles on the journal's website.

The tutorial review titled 'Fluorine in Medicinal Chemistry' from Sophia, published in Chemical Society Reviews, has been selected by the editor as the cover story. The review explains why fluorinated compounds have a remarkable record in medicinal chemistry and will play a continuing role in providing lead compounds for therapeutic applications. It provides a sampling of renowned fluorinated drugs and their mode of action with a discussion clarifying the role and impact of fluorine substitution on drug potency. The cover illustration was designed by Karl Harrison

Congratulations to Franck, who passed his DPhil viva. Franck is now working for Karus Therapeutics in Southampton.

Matthew Hopkinson has been awarded the 'GlaxoSmithKline Award in Organic Chemistry Part II, 2006/07' which recognises the two highest ranked Oxford graduates who continue into postgraduate research, within the Chemistry Research Laboratory, in the same calendar year.

Congratulations to Matthew Tredwell and Marie, their paper on "Fluorine-directed Diastereoselective Iodocyclizations" was selected as a Hot Paper by Angewandte Chemie International Edition.

Congratulations Colin! He was awarded a poster prize at the 7th RSC Fluorine Goup Meeting in Leicester.

Sophia, Colin and Harriet will all be presenting work at the 7th RSC Fluorine Group Meeting in Leicester, September 6-7.

Sophia will be presenting at the 234nd ACS National Meeting in Boston, America, August 19-23.

Colin Lam has been selected as one of the 100 students in both science and arts from across Europe to take part in the program "Roche Continents: Youth! Arts! Science!", held in Salzburg, Austria on 5-11 August (http://www.roche-continents.net). Fully sponsored by Roche, "Roche Continents" is designed as a unique event exploring the common ground of creativity and innovation in arts and science.

Congratulations Sophie! She was awarded the ISoFT'07 CMC Poster award for her outstanding poster presentation.

Sophie will be presenting work at the 2nd International Symposium for Fluorous Technologies in Yokohama, Japan, July 29-August 1st.

Sophia and Susan will be presenting at the 15th European Symposium on Fluorine Chemistry in Prague, Czech Republic, July 15-20.

Congratulations Samantha! She was awarded the Bannister Trust Prize jointly with Hamish Cavaye (Univ. College) for the best Organic Part II Thesis.

Work from Colin has been selected as a frontispiece for Angewandte Chemie. Enantioenriched, densely functionalized fluorinated carbocycles have been made accessible using a short synthesis featuring an operationally simple reverse cycloaddition-fluorination sequence.

Jose, Arnaud and Colin will all be presenting work at the 8th Tetrahedron Symposium in Berlin, Germany, June 26-29.

Congratulations to Matthew who passed his DPhil viva. Matthew has started a postdoc in Cambridge under the supervision of Dr. Gaunt.

Work from Harriet is featured on the front cover of Chem. Comm.. The paper reports on the synthesis of a novel [18F]NF reagent and on two radiochemical transformations for applications in Positron Emission Tomography.

Harriet will be presenting at the 17th International Symposium of Radiopharmaceutical Sciences in Aachen, Germany, April 29th - May 5th. She received a scholarship from the German Chemical Society to attend the conference.

The Siemens Oxford Molecular Imaging Laboratory (SOMIL), located in the Inorganic Chemistry Building, was formally opened by Michael Reitermann, President of Siemens Molecular Imaging, on January 24th 2007.

This laboratory was established as part of a £2 million research project funded by Siemens, DTI and EPSRC and involves Professor Jon Dilworth and Dr Veronique Gouverneur (Chemistry) and Professor M. Brady (Engineering). The laboratory has state of the art equipment for the handling of positron-emitting radioisotopes such as 64Cu, 18F and 68Ga used for PET imaging and also for gamma-emitting isotopes such as 99mTc widely used for SPECT images.

The facilities will permit the radiolabelling of biologically active molecules for imaging and therapeutic applications and collaborations with a number of Departments at the Medical Sciences Division are in place to carry out biological testing.

The opening of the new cancer hospital at the Churchill site with its human PET imaging facility and cyclotron will presage a major expansion in PET imaging in Oxford and the SOMIL facility will provide important radiochemistry support in terms of the development of new imaging agents.

http://www.chem.ox.ac.uk/somil.html

Carla is now a synthetic organic chemist with Syngenta [Basel, Switzerland].

Veronique has been appointed to the Editorial Board of Organic & Biomolecular Chemistry starting beginning 2007.

http://www.rsc.org/Publishing/Journals/OB/Index.asp

Congratulations to Katherine, who passed her DPhil viva. Katherine is taking up a postdoctoral position on a Marie Curie Transfer of Knowledge partnership between Celtic Catalysts (Dublin) and the research group of Professor Derek Boyd (Queen's University, Belfast).

Congratulations to Fabrice Bisaro, who passed his DPhil viva.

Congratulations Colin! Colin, who has just completed his first year D Phil, was awarded by the Department of Organic Chemistry the Lilly Prize for his outstanding work on the development of methodologies towards selectively fluorinated enantioenriched cyclic molecules. The other winners are Lisa Fishlock (TJD group), Kenneth Ling (SGD group) and Jasmin Mecinovic (CJS group).

Franck, Matt and Marcin will be presenting at the 232nd ACS National Meeting in San Francisco, America, September 10-14.

Matt, Sophie, Susan and Laurence will all be presenting at the the 6th Annual RSC Fluorine Conference in Manchester, August 31-September 1.

As a Recognition of Distinction Oxford University has conferred the title of Reader in Chemistry upon Veronique.

Veronique, Matt and Sophia will all be presenting at the 18th International Symposium on Fluorine Chemistry in Bremen, Germany, July 30 - August 4. Matt and Sophia have both received scholarships from the German Chemical Society to attend the conference.

Veronique has been invited to speak at the GRC on Heterocyclic compounds, July 2-7, 2006, Salve Regina University, Newport, RI (USA)

"Fabulous Fluorine" and "Constructing Life Sciences Compounds" Cover stories of Chemical and Engineering News, Volume 84, Number 23, June 5, 2006, p15-32. Veronique is interviewed by Ann M. Thayer (C & EN Houston) to give her views on the topic.

Congratulations to Carla; her paper "Catalytic Asymmetric Fluorinations" was amongst the top ten accessed on the web from the online version of Organic & Biomolecular Chemistry.

Katherine Dunne will attend and deliver a short talk at the 231st ACS National Meeting in Atlanta (USA), March 26-30.

Congratulations to Maud Reiter who passed her DPhil viva. Maud is leaving Oxford to postdoc with Professor David MacMillan (Caltech, USA) as a Fulbright Scholar.

Veronique will attend an EPSRC/RSC/CRSI workshop on bioorganic chemistry. The workshop is a bilateral meeting organised by the EPSRC/RSC in the UK and by the CRSI (Chemical Research Society India) in India. The workshop will be held on the 2nd February as a satellite meeting to the 8th International CRSI conference which takes place on 3-5 February 2006 at IIT, Mumbai, India. Veronique will then travel to Bangalore to vist and deliver talks at the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research and the Indian Institute of Science.

A grant of £2 million from Siemens Molecular Imaging Limited and DTI has been awarded to Veronique, Professor Jon Dilworth and Professor M. Brady of the Medical Vision Laboratory, Oxford, for the project 'Chemistry and Image Analysis for Assessment of Radiation Therapy using PET'. The programme will focus on the development of compounds of the radioisotopes 64-Cu and 18-F for imaging tumour hypoxia and new software for the analysis of the images and monitoring and management of radiotherapy.

Veronique in collaboration with Dr Mann (Imperial College) and Professor Cantrell (University of Dundee) have been awarded a 3-year grant of £840K by the BBSRC under the initiative "Selective chemical intervention in biological systems". The team will use a chemical genetic approach to identify protein kinase substrates.

Veronique has been awarded the AstraZeneca Award for Organic Chemistry 2005. She will receive the award at the AstraZeneca Charnwood laboratories on the 29th of November 2005.