Presentations by Professor Erick Carreira and Professor Christopher Jones

 

Date: 28^th April, 2025 (Monday)

Time: 5:30 - 7:30 pm (HKT)

 

Venue: Lecture Theatre P3, Chong Yuet Ming Physics Building

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Strategies and Tactics in Natural Products Syntheses as an Engine for Discovery

 

 

Department of Chemistry and Applied Biosciences

ETH Zurich, Switzerland

 

The talk will include discussion and analysis of recent natural product targets that have been synthesized in the group. It will focus on target oriented synthesis as an engine for the generation of novel methods and approaches to bioactive agents. The methods involve novel, unexpected reactivity and unusual building blocks that are fully integrated to lead to efficient routes.

 

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Direct Air Capture of CO₂: Chemistry & Engineering Combine for Climate Stabilization

 

 

School of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering

Georgia Institute of Technology, USA

 

Most current climate models suggest that limiting warming to <2°C will require large scale deployment of negative emissions technologies (NETs). NETs may be natural or technological, with one of the most scalable technological approaches being the direct capture of CO₂ from the air, or “direct air capture” (DAC). Because of the ultra-dilute nature of air, the separation of CO₂ from this mixture presents a significant engineering challenge.

 

In this lecture, I will reflect on examples of STEM research successes targeting societal grand challenges, followed by a deep dive into the challenges of DAC. I will describe the design and synthesis, characterization and application of porous oxide-supported amine materials that we have developed as cornerstones of new technologies for the removal of CO₂ from air. DAC technologies offer an interesting case study for the parallel design of molecules, materials, unit operations, and processes in chemistry and chemical engineering.