Professor Jean-Marie Lehn, 1987 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, gave a lecture at School of Pharmaceutical Science

Professor Jean-Marie Lehn, the father of supramolecular chemistry as well as the winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1987, was invited by academician Albert S. C. Chan, visiting School of Pharmaceutical Science, and  giving a lecture entitled “towards adaptive chemistry: Bioorganic and biomedical aspects”.

The lecture was hosted by Prof. Albert S. C. Chan, Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, professor at the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences . About 200 faculty and students from the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, School of Chemistry attended the lecture. 

Professor Jean-Marie Lehn giving a lecture at School of Pharmaceutical Science

Jean-Marie Lehn reviewed the history of chemistry. And he also introduced the Supramolecular chemistry. It aims at constructing and implementing highly complex chemical systems from molecular components held together by non-covalent intermolecular forces. Furthermore, supramolecular chemistry is intrinsically a dynamic chemistry in view of the lability of the non-covalent interactions connecting the molecular components of a supramolecular entity and the resulting ability of supramolecular species to exchange their components. In the Q&A session, Prof. Jean-Marie Lehn won a burst of applause by answering students' and teachers' questions with patience and care.

Professor Wenhao Hu, dean of the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences of Sun Yat-sen University, presented the certificate of honorary professor to Prof. Jean-Marie Lehn, hope further consolidate cooperation.

Professor Jean-Marie Lehn share ideas with student

Jean-Marie Lehn is Professor at the University of Strasbourg Institute for Advanced Study (USIAS), Honorary Professor at the Collège de France in Paris and Emeritus Professor at the University of Strasbourg. Professor Lehn's work developed into the chemistry of self-organization processes, based on the design of "programmed" chemical systems that undergo spontaneous assembly of suitable components into well-defined supramolecular species, directed by the supramolecular processing of molecular information. More recently, the implementation of dynamic features and of selection led to the development of “constitutional dynamic chemistry”, concerning entities able to undergo reorganization in response to external stimuli, thus pointing to the emergence of an “adaptive and evolutive chemistry”. In 1987, Jean Marie Lehn was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, together with Donald Cram and Charles J. Pedersen.