Dalton Young Researchers Award 2009 winner

Awarded in recognition of his research of solid state reactions of coordination compounds and the development of the use of halogen-bonding interactions in crystal engineering.

About the winner

Guillermo Mínguez Espallargas was born in Seville, Spain, in 1981. He studied Chemistry at the University of Seville with an Erasmus exchange year in Sheffield, UK. He graduated in 2004 at the top of his year winning numerous awards both within his university and nationally.

He then returned to Sheffield to undertake a PhD with Prof. Lee Brammer investigating intermolecular interactions and reactions in molecular crystals. In particular he studied the development of a new class of interactions, M-X...X-C halogen bonds (X = halogen), that show promise as an alternative or complement to hydrogen bonds for use in crystal engineering.

His PhD work also led him to explore the chemistry of non-porous crystals, where reactions with vapour phase molecules cause multiple structural changes by entering the crystals and reacting with specific sites despite their lack of porosity.

In summer 2008 he was awarded a Juan de la Cierva research fellowship to work at ICMol in Valencia, Spain, with Prof. Eugenio Coronado, where he continues to pursue his research interests in Inorganic Solid State Chemistry.

He has presented his work in lectures at a number of national and international conferences, and was an invited speaker at the XXI International Union of Crystallography triennial congress in Osaka, Japan, in August 2008.

In 2007 he was awarded an International Center for Diffraction Data Ludo Frevel Crystallography Scholarship and in 2008 was the gold medal winner in the European Young Chemist Award (PhD Student category) at the 2nd EuCheMS Chemistry Congress.