| Holger Braunschweig | |
| Birth Date: | 1961 |
| Birth Place: | Germany |
| Nationality: | German |
| Field: | Chemistry, Inorganic Chemistry, Organometallic Chemistry, Main-Group Chemistry, Organoboron chemistry |
| Work Institution: | University of Würzburg |
| Alma Mater: | RWTH Aachen University |
| Known For: | Organoboron chemistry, Borylene Chemistry, Diborynes, Diborenes |
| Website: | https://www.braunschweiggroup.de/ |
| Prizes: | 2009 DFG Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize, 2014 RSC Main Group Award,http://www.rsc.org/ScienceAndTechnology/Awards/MainGroupChemistryAward/2014-Winner.asp 2016 GDCh Alfred Stock Memorial Prize.http://www.chemistryviews.org/details/ezine/9870971/Alfred_Stock_Memorial_Award_2016.html |
Holger Braunschweig is Head and Chair of Inorganic Chemistry at the Julius-Maximilians-University of Würzburg in Würzburg, Germany. He is best known for founding the field of transition metal-boron multiple bonding (transition metal borylenes),[1] [2] [3] [4] the synthesis of the first stable compounds containing boron-boron[5] and boron-oxygen[6] triple bonds, the isolation of the first non-carbon/nitrogen main-group dicarbonyl,[7] and the first fixation of dinitrogen at an element of the p-block of the periodic table.[8] By modifying a strategy pioneered by Prof. Gregory Robinson of the University of Georgia, Braunschweig also discovered the first rational and high-yield synthesis of neutral compounds containing boron-boron double bonds (diborenes).[9] [10] In 2016 Braunschweig isolated the first compounds of beryllium in the oxidation state of zero.[11]
Braunschweig obtained his Ph.D. and Habilitation from RWTH Aachen with P. Paetzold and worked as a postdoctoral researcher with Michael F. Lappert, FRS, at the University of Sussex, Brighton. After two years at Imperial College London as Senior Lecturer and Reader he took up a Chair of Inorganic Chemistry at the Julius-Maximilians-University of Würzburg in 2002, and is now also the founding director of the Institute for Sustainable Chemistry & Catalysis with Boron (ICB) .
In 2009 Braunschweig was awarded the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize of the German Research Foundation (DFG) – the highest German-based research prize. He was also awarded the 2014 RSC Main Group Awardhttp://www.rsc.org/ScienceAndTechnology/Awards/MainGroupChemistryAward/2014-Winner.asp and the 2016 Alfred Stock Memorial Prize of the German Society of Chemists.http://www.chemistryviews.org/details/ezine/9870971/Alfred_Stock_Memorial_Award_2016.html He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, a member of the German National Academy of Science (Leopoldina),https://www.leopoldina.org/en/members/list-of-members/member/1506/ the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities,http://www.badw.de/en/community-of-scholars/members.html?tx_badwdb_badwperson%5Bper_id%5D=338&tx_badwdb_badwperson%5BpartialType%5D=BADWPersonDetailsPartial&tx_badwdb_badwperson%5BmemberType%5D=&tx_badwdb_badwperson%5Baction%5D=show&tx_badwdb_badwperson%5 and the North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities and the Arts.http://www.awk.nrw.de/akademie/mitglieder/korrespondierende-mitglieder.html