Last Friday, Maru joined the evaluation committee of Ane García’s Dissertation at the University of the Basque Country (UPV), together with the other two members of the jury, Dr. Svetlana Tsogoeva (University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany) and Dr. Raúl San Martín (UPV, Bilbao).

The Thesis has been supervised by Dr. Claudio Palomo (UPV) and Dr. Antonia Mielgo (UPV), and focuses on the advances made in the research and application of a type of organocatalysts widely studied within the Asymmetric Catalysis and Chemical Synthesis Research Group where the doctoral student has completed her PhD studies: bifunctional Brønsted base catalysts derived from amino acids. Proof of the relevance and importance of these results is that they have been translated into scientific publications in high-level international journals (CEJ 2021, 2483 and EJOC 2021, 3604).

Congratulations to Ane and their supervisors, and of course, all the best for her in the future!

Thanks Claudio and Antonia for the invitation! It made me particularly happy because I did my Doctoral Thesis on the synthesis of beta-lactams and Palomo was a referent on this subject in the international scientific scenario, so he was one of the first scientists I had the honor of meeting.

A pleasure to be in San Sebastian with all of you, surrounded by nice people, nice science, nice food and many laughs and nice memories!