Miquel A. Pericàs - Biography#

Miquel A. Pericàs was born in Palma de Mallorca (Spain) in 1951. He studied Chemical Engineering (Institut Químic de Sarrià, 1974) and Chemistry (University of Barcelona 1974), and obtained his PhD (University of Barcelona) in 1979. After postdoctoral studies at the Spanish Research Council (1979-1980), he joined the Department of Organic Chemistry of the University of Barcelona in 1980 as an Associate Professor, being promoted to Full Professor in 1991. In 2000 he was appointed as the Founding Director of the Institute of Chemical Research of Catalonia (ICIQ), a position he has hold till quite recently (September 2020). He is currently a Group Leader at ICIQ, and his major research interests are focused on enantioselective catalysis in batch and flow with species immobilized onto polymers and magnetic nanoparticles, and on the discovery of new reactions mediated by light (>315 peer reviewed publications, h index = 56). He has supervised 57 graduate students (52 completed PhD Theses plus 5 ongoing) and 55 Post-doc associates. Twelve former research associates occupy academic positions in Spain (6), France, UK, Turkey, Uruguay, China and India.

In 2019 he received the Medal of the Real Sociedad Española de Química and was elected as a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences and Arts of Barcelona. He is a member of the Real Sociedad Española de Química (Vice-president in 2006-2011), Societat Catalana de Química (President in 1986-1987), American Chemical Society also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry. His research is funded by the Government of Spain ["Contributions to Catalysis towards Sustainable Chemical Production (CATCHEMPRO)"; MICINN, ref. PID2019-109236RB-I00, 2020-2022] and by the European Union [“Enabling Technologies and Drug Discovery: Continuous Flow Processes to Discover Novel Antiviral Inhibitors (VIRO-FLOW)”; Horizon 2020 EU, H2020-MSCA-ITN-2017, ref. VIRO-FLOW-766058, 2017-2021].