Welcome to the Masson group!
Led by passionate organic chemists, our group has developed a strong expertise in catalysis over the years. We tend to explore diverse ways to improve the efficiency and the selectivity of chemical reactions. Our favorite research areas include chiral phosphoric acids and phosphate salts organocatalyses, metallo- and organophotoredox reactions as well as applications of electrochemistry in organic synthesis. Involved in both catalysts design and elaboration of original reactivities, we take advantage of these new synthetic tools to work on the synthesis of natural and bioactive products. Our fundamental and academical research focus proceeds together with more applied realizations thanks to industrial partnerships.
Discover the POWER of catalysis by checking our Research and our Publications pages !
The POWER team (April 2024)
From left to right
Front row: Hemender Chand, Emma Naulin, Matteo Leone, Arthur Baudement, Emeric Montinho-Inacio
Second row: Luca Nicchio, Timothé Ferasse, Dr. Luc Neuville, Gabriele Scarica, Dr. Géraldine Masson, Aurélien Brion
The HitCat Labcom members (April 2022)
From left to right,: Dr. Luc Neuville, Hugo Pierre, Dr. Gérard Guillamot, Dr. Géraldine Masson and Dr. Franck Le Vaillant
Highlights
Our brand new Dr. Matteo Leone (the fourth from the left) brilliantly defended his thesis on 25th of April 2024. Congratulations! His defense, supported by th PhotoReAct project, resumed three years of work in the team and in Timothy Noël's group dealing with photocatalyzed reactions.
This title was granted by a jury comprising, from left to right, Pr. Xavier Moreau, Pr. Olga Garcia, Dr. Géraldine Masson, Dr. Luc Neuville (invited), the president Dr. Clémence Allain, Pr. Philippe Belmont and Pr. Damien Bonne.
Congratulations to Damien Bouchet (the third from the right) who obtained his Ph.D. with flying colors on 24th of january 2024! His defense resumed his three years work dealing with asymmetric organocatalyzed cycloadditions and photocatalytic dearomatization of indoles.
This title was granted by a jury comprising , from left to right, Dr. Géraldine Masson, Dr. Aurélien Alix (invited), Dr. Cyril Ollivier, Pr. Xavier Moreau, the president Dr. Clémence Allain, Dr. Amandine Guérineau and Dr. Adrien Quintard.
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Marine (the third from the right) obtained her Ph. D. on the 13th of December. Congratulation for her presentation focusing on the catalytic synthesis of triarylmethanes as well as chiral phosphoric acid-mediated cycloadditions. Her work was evaluated by a jury comprising, from left to right, Dr. Luc Neuville, Prof. Isabelle Chataigner, Dr. Cyril Ollivier, the president Prof. Giang Vo-Thanh and Prof. Isabelle Gillaizeau. Dr. Géraldine Masson was invited to seat by their side.
Congratulations to Wei-Yang (the forthfrom the left) who successfully defended is Ph. D. on the 22nd of September! He presented his three years work dealing with chiral phosphoric acids catalyzed cycloadditions towards azacycles.
This title was granted by a jury comprising , from left to right, the president Dr. Jerôme Hannedouche, Prof. Philippe Belmont, Prof. Xavier Moreau, Dr. Marc Presset, Dr. Erica Benedetti and Dr. Géraldine Masson. Dr. Luc Neuville was invited to seat by their side.
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Latest news
2024
November 4th: Congrats to Luca Nicchio and our previous visiting PhD student Lorenzo Di Terlizzi in collaboration with PhotogreenLab (University of Pavia, Italy - Pr. M. Fagnoni) for their great work on the photochemical synthesis of 1,2,4-triazoles from arylazo sulfones, just publish in Adv. Synth. Catal!
November 1st: Today the team is glad to welcome two new members in the team, Julie Renoult and Nicolas Gillaizeau Simonian. Our new CIFRE PhD student Julie is going to work at Seqens on new organocatalytic and photocatalytic methodologies for the synthesis of new Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients. Nicolas, our new Post doc, will be mainly focused on the development of new photocatalyzed reactions.
October 6th: Welcome to Radosław, our new 4th year visiting student, coming from the group of Dr. Przemysław Boratyński (Wroclaw, Poland)! He is going to work with us on the synthesis of new organocatlysts until the end of the year
October 1st: Welcome to Christopher, who begins his PhD in the team today about asymmetric photoredox catalysis!
September 18th: Thrilled to contribute to the electrosynthetic sphere through our last work on stereoselective synthesis of Fissoldhimine alkaloid analogues through a sequential electro-oxidation/heterodimerization of ureas, just published in Chemical Communications! Congrats to Aurélien Brion and Emma Naulin!
August 17th: Last summer news: a first paper in organocatalysis for Aurelien Brion and our previous visiting student Vittoria Martini! Congrats for their work on CPA-catalyzed asymmetric Povarov reaction with phenolic diene, just published in Journal of Organic Chemistry!
June 18th : Congratulation to Dr. Wei-yang Ma and the brand new Dr. Matteo Leone for their work on "Photocatalytic Asymmetric Acyl Radical Truce Smiles Rearrangement for the Synthesis of Enantioenriched α-Aryl Amides" just published in Angewandte Chemie!
April 16th: Congrats to Emeric Montinho-Inacio, Dr. Damien Bouchet and Dr. Wei-Yang Ma for their work on Decatungstate-Photocat.Diastereoselective Dearomative Hydroalkylation of Indoles, just published in Eur. J. Org. Chem. !
February 21st: And a second paper for Matteo in a week !! Check this nice work just published in ChemEurope dealing with photocat. stereoselective radical Alkylation of chiral N-sulfinyl. Congrats to Matteo and Joseph Milton !
February 19th: So thrilled to see that the last work of our Ph.D. student Matteo Leone was published in Nature Communication!! Thank you for the nice collaboration with the Noel Research Group and the PhotoReAct project and all involved in the project detailing a novel metal-free photocatalytic cross-electrophile coupling that enables C1 homologation and Csp3-Csp3 coupling.
January 6th: Welcome to Gabriele, a new visiting student from Pr. G. Maestri group (Parma, Italy, 2nd year of Ph.D.). He is working on asymmetric Chiral Phosphoric Acid Catalysis.
January 1st: Welcome to Timothé, who will work with us for 6 months on Chiral Phosphoric Acid Catalysis during his final master internship.
2023
December 19th: Second work published in Organic Letters in a month! Congrats to Dr. Andrea Serafino, Hugo Pierre and Dr. Franck Le Vaillant in collabration with the pharmaceutical industry Seqens for their work on Photocatalytic decarboxylative Borylation
December 12th: We are thrilled to share with you the first paper resulting from the collaboration with PhotogreenLab (University of Pavia, Italy - Pr. M. Fagnoni), just published in Organic Letters! Congratulations to Luca Nicchio, and our two former students Lorenzo Di Terlizzi and Camilla Callegari for their work on "Visible-Light-Mediated Divergent and Regioselective Vicinal Difunctionalization of Styrenes with Arylazo Sulfones".
November 28th: We are thrilled to see our last paper on ""Enantioselective and Regiodivergent Synthesis of Dihydro-1,2-oxazines from Triene-Carbamates via Chiral Phosphoric Acid-Catalysis"" published in JACS ! Congratulations to Dr. Marine Lombard and Emma Naulin.
November 2nd: Welcome to Hemender, our new MSCA Postdoctoral fellow coming from India. He will work on a total synthesis project during these two next years.
October 1st: Today the team has the pleasure to welcome our new PhD student Arthur. He is going to work on organocatalysis and on a total synthesis project.
July 10th: Congratulation to Damien Bouchet who published his work on an Isothiourea-Catalyzed Enantioselective reaction in Organic Letter!
June 5th: Marianna is our second new visiting Ph. D. student of the month. Coming from Rome (Pr. Lanzalunga), she is going work on organocatalysis. Welcome to her!
June 1st: Welcome to Joseph, our new visiting Ph. D. student coming from Poland (in the group of Pr. Dorota Gryko)! He will work on photocatalysis.
February 1st: We are glad to welcome Damla, our new postdoctoral fellow ! She is going to work on organocatalysis.
January 19th: Welcome to Camilla who begins a master internship in the team today about asymmetric organophotocatalysis
2022
December 15th: Florent finished his post-doc today in the team. We wish you good luck towards new horizons!
December 13th: Congratulation to Marine who defended her Ph. D. with great success ! The whole team wish you the best for your future.
December 3rd: Vittoria is our new visiting Ph. D. candidate from Parma. She is going to work on organocatalysis. Welcome in the team !
November 11th: Congratulation to Damien and Thomas who published an overview of the strategies developped in the team to achieve the difunctionalization of enecarbamates and enamides ! You can read it in Accounts of Chemical Research !
November 2nd: Luca is arriving from Italy as a visiting Ph. D. student. The whole team is glad to welcome him !
October 3rd: Welcome to Lorenzo Di Terlizzi, our new visiting Ph. D. candidate from the Maurizio Fagnoni group ! He is going to work on photocatalysis in the team !
October 1st: Today the team is glad to welcome two new Ph. D. candidates. Emeric is going to work on tetrazines and heptazines photocatalysis whereas Emma will focus on asymmetric organocatalysis.