It is the goal of our lab to create 'greener' methodologies for the production of valuable chemicals.

To address current sustainability issues of the chemical industry, we need to develop alternative technologies to eliminate environmentally damaging chemicals and by-products. This can only be achieved by taking inspiration from the Nature as 'what works' is based on its 3.8 billion years of evolution. Nature constructs and decomposes complex molecules with the help of enzymes as catalysts and light as the ultimate energy source. However, despite fundamental benefits of enzymes, their industrial application can be limited by their availability, instability towards certain conditions, cost etc.

Our lab develops catalytic methods that mimic efficiency characteristic for enzymes by combining the robust nature of simple nature-derived catalysts with light as the source of energy.

In particular, we have already developed multiple chemical transformations based on photochemical reactions of porphyrins and vitamin B₁₂ as catalysts.

For more information see our     publications page.