Congratulations to Prof. SUN Jianwei on awarding the Collaborative Research Fund (CRF) 2021-22

Prof Jianwei Sun, Professor of Chemistry, has currently been awarded over HK$ 6M from the Collaborative Research Fund (CRF) to carry out a multidisciplinary research on “Development of a New Generation of Privileged Chiral Catalysts for Asymmetric Synthesis”.

In this 3-year project, Prof Sun and his team aim to develop a new generation of privileged chiral catalysts for asymmetric synthesis. The designed new chiral catalysts will also be applied to harness clean energy for organic synthesis and catalyze fixation and conversion of greenhouse gas. For example, the large conjugation system combined with the chirality feature of the structures endows them with great potential to serve as photosensitizers for photochemical asymmetric reactions. In the meanwhile, they are also potential catalysts for direct conversion of CO2 to synthesize value-added chiral functional materials. Prof Sun expects that the new catalysts will find long-term applications in academic laboratories and various industries.

Collaborating with the Hong Kong University (HKU), this project will be joint efforts of four research laboratories with complementary expertise in organocatalysis, metal catalysis, computation, and industrial synthesis.

Administered by the Research grants council (RGC), the Collaborative Research Fund (CRF) aims at encouraging research groups in UGC-funded universities to engage in collaborative research across disciplines and across universities with a view to enhancing the research output of universities in terms of the level of attainment, quantity, dimensions and speed. CRF is one of the most competitive research grants in Hong Kong.

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Collaborative Research Fund projects: here