Beneficiary 3

Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL)
Institute of Chemical Sciences and Engineering

The EPFL (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne; http://www.epfl.ch) is a high-level academic institution, which was ranked the 40th best academic institution in the world (8th best in Europe) in a survey by the English Newspaper “The Times Higher Education” in 2012. It is part of the CLUSTER project (Consortium Linking Universities of Science and Technology for Education and Research), which links 12 European institutes from 12 different countries. The EPFL is currently involved in 110 European projects inside the FP7 framework. During 2007-2011, 65 European Research Council (ERC) grants have been awarded to researchers at EPFL.
The main research activity of LSCI is the development of earth-abundant catalysts for synthesis and energy applications. The lab has developed well-defined nickel catalysts for the cross coupling of non-activated alkyl halides and direct C-H alkyalation, efficient copper catalysis for cross coupling and C-H functionalization reactions, iron-based model complexes of a hydrogenase enzyme, and heterogeneous catalysts for water splitting. The lab has strong expertise and relevant experience in base metal catalysis and its application in organic synthesis.

NoNoMeCat Projects

Principal Investigator: Prof. Dr. Xile Hu