Homogeneous Catalysis Award 2011 winner

Awarded for the use of transition metal catalysts for the formation of C-C and C-N bonds by 'Borrowing Hydrogen' methodology.

About the Winner

Jonathan Williams was born in Stourbridge, England in 1964.  He received a BSc from University of York in 1983, followed by a DPhil. from University of Oxford in 1986 under the supervision of with Prof. S G Davies. 

After a post-doctoral fellowship at Harvard with Prof. D. A. Evans (1989-1991), he was appointed to a Lectureship in Organic Chemistry at Loughborough University in 1991. He was then appointed as a Professor of Organic Chemistry at the University of Bath in 1996, where his research has mainly involved the use of transition metals for the catalysis of organic reactions.  In particular, his early independent research involved the design of phosphine/oxazoline ligands for asymmetric allylic substitution and the first examples of metal/enzyme combinations for dynamic kinetic resolution processes.  

More recently, he has been developing 'Borrowing Hydrogen' methodology for alkylation reactions using alcohols, along with metal catalysed reactions for the synthesis of amides.