Chemistry undergraduate students win multiple prizes in national research competition

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SCI Poster winners

Bradley Cooper and Bethany Trueman, year 4 MChem students in the Department of Chemistry, have respectively won the 1st and one of the runners-up prizes at the National Undergraduate Online Poster Competition 2022 organised by the Young Chemists’ Panel of the Society of the Chemical Industry (SCI) during the last week of June 2022.

This competition is aimed at Chemistry students in the final year of their undergraduate studies at UK universities who are invited to post an online poster of their research projects at this national event and is funded by Alderley Park Bruntwood SciTech, AstraZeneca, Charles River, Evotec, GSK, Sai and Teledyne Isco.

Bradley’s poster was entitled 'Probing the Diastereoselectivity of Proline N-Oxide Formation'. His research showed that L-Proline derivatives with homologated methyl ester, primary alcohol, secondary amide side chains can all undergo N-oxidation with complete syn-diastereoselectivity. Bradley said ‘I am delighted and very grateful to have won this poster competition. It has been a privilege to work on this project with Dr. Ian O’Neil and Dr. Neil Kershaw over the past year. Thanks to the SCI for providing a platform for undergraduates to display their research’. Bradley will now start in September 2022 a PhD in Organic Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Manchester.

Dr. Ian O’Neil, Reader in the Department of Chemistry, commented: ‘This is an outstanding achievement for Bradley who fully deserved this award given his performance in his research project’.

Bethany’s work showed that the electrophilic activation of [1.1.1]propellane with N-iodosuccinimide can address the lack of reactivity of heteroaromatic thiols (that fail in their reaction with [1.1.1]propellane under radical-mediated conditions in the literature) for the synthesis of sulfur-substituted bicyclo[1.1.1]pentanes in a poster entitled ‘Synthesis of Sulfur-Substituted Bicyclo[1.1.1]pentanes by Iodo-Sulfenylation of [1.1.1]Propellane’. Bethany said ‘This is a really proud moment for me. I am very thankful to the SCI for organising the event, and giving me opportunity to present what I've been working on for the past year. I am especially grateful to my supervisor, Dr Christophe Aïssa, without whom I wouldn't have been able to work on this amazing project.’

Dr. Christophe Aïssa, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Chemistry, added: ‘I was fortunate to host Beth in the group. I am also tremendously proud that her achievements were recognised at this event which also featured so many brilliant final year MChem students from our department.’

Prof. Frédéric Blanc from the Department of Chemistry and year 4 MChem research project module leader said: ‘The prizes received are a testament of the commitment of our final year MChem project students and of the dedication of the academic members of staff to train the next generation of chemists.’

Bradley and Bethany will soon graduate with a First class MChem degree and the Department wishes them all the best with their future endeavours’.