Profile
Prof Matthew GAUNT
Principal Investigator
Prof Matthew Gaunt graduated from the University of Birmingham with First Class Honours for Chemistry in 1995. He subsequently completed his PhD studies under the supervision of Dr Jonathan Spencer at the University of Cambridge as a Wellcome Trust Scholar in 1999. He then moved to the University of Pennsylvania, undertaking research as a GlaxoWellcome Postdoctoral Fellow with Prof. Amos B. Smith. In 2001, Matthew returned to Cambridge to work with Prof. Steven V. Ley as a British Ramsay Memorial Fellow and Junior Research Fellow at Magdalene College.
Prof Gaunt began his independent research career in 2003 at Cambridge, firstly as a Royal Society University Research Fellow, then as Lecturer in 2006, Reader in 2010, and as Professor from 2012. He was elected holder of the Yusuf Hamied 1702 Chair of Chemistry in 2019. He is currently Chair of the Synthetic Chemistry Research Interest Group and Director of the SynTech Centre for Doctoral Training. Matthew is also a Co-Director at the Innovation Centre in Digital Molecular technologies (iDMT).
Prof Gaunt is also an Associate Editor at Synlett and a member of the Academic Advisory Board for Advanced Synthesis & Catalysis.
Cambridge
Researchers
SM3
Research Interest
Prof Gaunt's research focuses on the development of new chemical reactivity enabled by catalysts and is driven by programmes centred on metal-catalysed C–H bond activation, photoredox catalysis and selective chemical modification of biomolecules. His group's research has been acknowledged through a number of awards.
Key Publications
ResearchGate profile
Bo Li, Ala Bunescu, Matthew J. Gaunt, Multicomponent synthesis of α-chloro alkylboronic esters via visible-light-mediated dual catalysis, Chem. 2022, 9, 216
Sanesh Mistry, Roopender Kumar, Andrew Lister, Matthew J. Gaunt, C(sp3)–C(sp3) coupling of non-activated alkyl-iodides with electron-deficient alkenes via visiblelight/silane-mediated alkylradical formation, Chem. Sci. 2022, 13, 13241
Alexander Pomberger, Antonio A. Pedrina McCarthy, Ahmad Khan, Simon Sung, Connor, J. Taylor, Matthew J. Gaunt, Lucy Colwell, David Walz, Alexei A. Lapkin, The effect of chemical representation on active machine learning towards closed-loop optimization React. Chem. Eng. 2022, 7, 1368
J. Henry Blackwell, Georgia R. Harris, Milo A. Smith, Matthew J. Gaunt , Modular Photocatalytic Synthesis of α-Trialkyl-α-Tertiary Amines, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2021,143, 15946
Matthew J. Gaunt, Jacob M. Janey, Danielle M. Schultz, Tim Cernak, Myths of highthroughput experimentation and automation in chemistry, Chem 2021, 7, 2259
Achievements
2023 Karl Wamsler Award for Innovation in Catalysis
2019 RSC Synthetic Organic Chemistry Award
2016 ACS Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award
2015–2020 Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award
2015 Novartis Lecturer Award
2013 RSC Corday-Morgan Prize
2011 Organic Reactions Lecturer
2011 ERC Starting Investigative Research Fellow
2010 EPSRC Leadership Fellow
2009 AstraZeneca Award for Organic Chemistry
2009 Chem. Soc. Rev. Emerging Investigator Award
2008 Novartis Early Career Award in Organic Chemistry
2008 Eli Lilly Young Lecturer Award
2005 Dow Pharma Prize for Creativity in Chiral Chemistry