Welcome to the
Welcome to the
Welcome to the website of our Lab!
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We are a physical-organic chemistry and photochemistry group in the Van't Hoff Institute for Molecular Science at the University of Amsterdam. We combine state-of-the-art synthesis, quantum-chemical calculations, and spectroscopy to create and investigate organic molecules with unusual shapes and properties. Have a closer look at our research here!
For a clear idea of our background and recent endeavors, take a look at our publications here.
14.7. Tomáš gave his talk on Sergey's and Remek's work on photocages at the ICP 2025 in Aachen. What a pleasure it was to share the latest results with the community and to step on the stage right after Tomáš's former postdoc advisor, Mike Wasielewski.
11.7. Nienke successfully finished her Bc thesis research in the lab. What a pleasant surprise when one learns an exciting result at the thesis presentation. Nienke, all the best in your pursuit for the Master's degree.
17.6. Sergey is now a Dr! Congratulations to the successful defence of your outstanding work. We wish you all the best in your future career. Your humor will be missed dearly :-)
26.3. The front cover of the latest issue of JACS published today highlights the paper from Remek! Great design by Peter Štacko. Testament of the outstanding work of Remek and Juraj!
6.3. Great news and congratulations on the just accepted paper by Sergey, Hua, and Luise! A fine piece of mechanistic studies on the formation of our rylene diimide cages. You can find the open-access paper here.
22.1. The lovely piece of art designed by Michel Rickhaus (his group page here) in support of Sergey's collaboration with Štacko group is now on the cover of issue 4 of the Chemical Science. Inspiration came from the album cover of Joe Satriani's album that my dad kept in my room when I was a kid. Fond memories. See the cover here.
20.1. Fantastic news for Remek! His work has been published in JACS! Wonderful combination of nanohoops and photocages led to a new approach to uncage iron ions. Congrats for this fine piece of science, Remek. The work is open-access, so you may want to read it here.
11.1. Kovida did again :-) Big congrats to her new work now online in Helvetica Chimica Acta! Look at another insightful chiral nanohoop that she made and studied. And with this piece of work, we wish happy coming birthday to our dear friend, Marcel Mayor. Read here.
1.1. The New one is here again! Time to recap the ups and downs in the old 2024 and thrust forward to new adventures of 2025. Wish everybody success and all the best in the coming year.
20.12. Hooray! Kovida's work is now online in Chemical Science! What a clumsy peer-review process this was. Props to Kovida and the team for all the perserverance and, of course, the great work on the role of exciton delocalization in CPL. Read here.
9.12. Warm welcome (with a cold beer) to Tu-Nan Gao who joined the group as postdoctoral researcher. All the best Tu-Nan, looking forward to see new chemistry magic unfold.
11.11. Reason to celebrate :-) Our fresh collaboration with Štacko group at Uni Zurich brought another ripe fruit. Congrats to all authors and especially Sergey on the latest publication in Chemical Science where we explored the limits of uncaging with Cy7 dyes! Did we really surf? :-)
2.9. We welcome a new PhD student in the group, Robin van Damme! We love his enthusiasm and we are looking forward for exciting chemistry to happen in the next few years. All the best Robin! His personal profile will come soon.
22.8. New preprint on ChemRxiv from Sergey and Hua! They looked at the synthesis of our modified rylene diimide cages and showed that we deal with kinetic trapping in their synthesis. It will allow us to make low-symmetry cages in the future. Stay tuned for this exciting chemistry to come and read about the initial step in their current preprint.
24.7. New preprint on ChemRxiv from Remek! He used strain to induce unprecedent photochemical reactivity of otherwise stable ferrocene complex and transformed it into a photocage that can release iron ions by irradiation with green light. Excellent stuff!
23.7. Great news arrived from NWO! We received a grant of 50k EUR within the NWO XS program to test a high-risk idea. This time, we plan to dive into polymer chemistry for the first time. Cross your fingers and if you are interested to work with us, a postdoc is wanted!
9.7. Congratulations to Thijs de Groot and Roberto Cappabianca who successfully defended their research project and bachelor thesis. They made new cool molecules and learnt a lot in the process. We are proud of their achievements!
10.3. Congratulations to Sergey! His supramolecular nanotube is now online in Chemistry - A European Journal. It is open access, so you can read the work here.
7.2. New preprint on ChemRxiv from Juraj! Now, we understand what is behind the bisignate CPL that we recorded for Juraj's original Möbius [6]helicene nanohoop. Two new hoops with [5]helicene revealed that the topological bistability of their pi-system is the culprit.
29.1. We say goodbye to Noah who spent the last 10 months with us working on his Master thesis. What a great time it was, although it flew so fast. Noah, you will be missed, but we are excited about your next journey in the group of Michal Juríček. All the best for your PhD! :-)
2023
6.12. A perspective article of Juraj about topological bistability of pi-electron system in his helicene carbon nanohoops has been accepted to Synlett. A great read with a coffee :-)
30.11. New preprint on ChemRxiv from Kovida! She red-shifted the emission of circularly polarized light from carbon nanohoops and found out about the role of exciton delocalization in the process at the same time. Really cool stuff! Congrats, Kovida.
10.11. New preprint on ChemRxiv from Sergey! Fun project on inducing supramolecular nanotubes to form in the solid state. Sergey accomplished it, congrats and let's submit now.
9.10. We have an opening for a PhD student in time-resolved spectroscopy of our organic cages and more! Have a look here.
2.10. Sergey's paper has been accepted to JACS Au, hooray! Great collaboration with our colleagues in Basel and Vienna. We learnt a great deal about photochemistry in the gas phase and we look forward to do more in the future.
1.8. And finally Sergey is in Amsterdam. The last member from Uni Bern is with us and we are finally complete! It took only 2.5 years to gather the entire group in a single place :-D
19.7. Curo-pi5 has launched in Prague! Juraj, Kovida, Remek, and Tomáš are all there. The first three with exciting posters and Tomáš with a talk.
1.7. Juraj rejoined the group in Amsterdam for his postdoc. Looking forward to explore aromaticity in his Möbius molecules!
26.6. A result of Sergey's fun collaboration with Dr. Köhler (Uni Basel) and Prof. Arndt (Uni Vienna) is now on ChemRxiv. Learn about how one can trigger a heterolytic photorelease in high vacuum. Yes, you read it right, in high vacuum! Preprint here.
9.1. There is a new Dr. in the town! Congratulations to Juraj for his fantastic PhD defense. What a pleasure it was to have you in the group the past 4 years. Glad that more exciting collaboration is still to come :-)
6.1. Congratulations to Remek and Juraj for their paper exploring silyl protecting groups in the synthesis of carbon nanohoops published in Synthesis. Great job guys, really useful chemistry.
1.1. New Year, new opportunities! Our groups has just officially started its adventures in the new place. Welcome to the Van't Hoff Institute for Molecular Sciences at the University of Amsterdam. All the best in 2023 everyone!
2022
21.9. Juraj presented his work on helicene carbon nanohoops at the 28. Lecture Conference on Photochemistry in Düsseldorf. Great job, Juraj!
5.9. Remek, Kovida and Sergey took the Graduate Student Symposium in Bern by storm this year. Great talks all of you and congratulations to Kovida for getting the prize for the best talk!
18.7. Juraj's work on CPL-active Möbius helicene nanohoop has just been accepted to Angewandte Chemie! Fantastic job by Juraj and a really exciting read can be accessed by clicking here. Enjoy!
22.6. Hooray! Big congratulations to Hua, the first graduate (Dr. Huang ;-)) from our lab who successfully passed her defense today. What a fantastic talk she gave. Hua, all the best in your job in Basel. Farewell :-)
11.6. Juraj's paper submitted again. It took us nearly a year to get crystal structure of his fancy Möbius nanhoop. It shines bright light with a twist. Cross the fingers to read it soon!
6.6. Remek, Kovida and Sergey are in Bologna at IX Ciamician Photochemistry School. Enjoy the lovely week in Italy with great lectures!
14.2. So many good news today! Warm welcome to master students Gianna and Simon who joined us for their first lab day today. All the best guys, let your chemistry work smoothly. Their bios are coming soon. Stay tuned!
14.2. Happy Valentine's day and happy birthday, Tomáš. As a gift, the triangulene story is now online in Chemical Communications, just look here!
4.2. The triangulene story with Juricek group has been accepted to Chem. Comm.! What a peer-review journey that was.
1.1. It is here again, a New Year! All the best and lots of personal and professional success to you all.