Łukasz Woźniak, PhD student under the supervision of Prof. Paolo Melchiorre, has received the 1st award for the oral presentation “Photo-Organocatalytic Enantioselective Perfluoroalkylation of β-Ketoesters” at the 13th International Congress of Young Chemists “YoungChem 2015” that took place on October 7 to 11 at Cracow.

Łukasz presented his work on the visible-light-driven, phase-transfer-catalyzed, enantioselective perfluoroalkylation and trifluoromethylation of cyclic β-ketoesters. The photo-organocatalytic process, which occurs at ambient temperature and under visible light illumination, is triggered by the photochemical activity of in situ-generated electron donor–acceptor complexes, arising from the association of chiral enolates and perfluoroalkyl iodides.