Professor
Ari M.P.Koskinen was born on September 22, 1956 in Finland. He
received his M.Sc. (Chem. Eng.) in 1979 (with professor T. Hase,
development of the synthesis of alkyl tert-alkyl ethers for
anti-knock agents), Licentiate in Technology in 1982 and Doctor of
Technology in 1983 (with professor M. Lounasmaa, methodology
development on the modified Polonovski reaction for indole alkaloid
synthesis), all at the Helsinki University of Technology, Finland.
After postdoctoral studies at the University of California, Berkeley
(professor Henry Rapoport 1983-85 and 1987-88, total synthesis of
anatoxin-a, and conformationally constrained peptidomimetics) he
accepted an appointment as a Project Leader in New Drug Development at
Orion Corporation – Fermion, Finland (1985-1987). His research group
was among the first in Scandinavia to adopt computer aided drug design
(QSAR and CoMFA) as well as computerized database handling protocols
in new lead identification. Returning to the Academia, he joined the
University of Surrey, England, as a lecturer in 1989. He was then
appointed as Professor of Chemistry (especially Synthetic Organic
Chemistry) at the University of Oulu, Finland in 1992, and transferred
to his current position at the Helsinki University of Technology in
August, 1999 as Professor of Organic Chemistry (the old Gustav Komppa
chair). He also holds docentships at the Universities of Helsinki and
Turku, Finland. Prof. Koskinen is a member of the Finnish Academy of
Sciences and Letters since 2003, and member of the Novartis Foundation
International Scientific Advisory Panel since 2004.
The main objective of his research interest is to
develop novel synthetic technologies for the construction of complex
natural and non-natural compounds with multiple chiral centers in
enantiopure form. An extension of this work is to apply these
structures to directed biological recognition phenomena. The
development of synthetic methodology is centered on understanding
basic phenomena of weak forces controlling the reactivities of
chemicals through subtle conformational effects. Target applications
include asymmetric cyclopropanation reactions, catalytic asymmetric
oxidation methods, and novel enantiocontrolled carbon-carbon bond
formation reactions using chiral phosphonate reagents and/or
organo(metallic)catalysis.
He is the author or co-author of some 110
publications, ten patents and two books.
Professor Koskinen is active both nationally and
internationally (member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the
Finnish Chemical Industry Federation, a founding member of the
European Chemical Society, European Society for Combinatorial
Sciences, and management committees of EU-research programs).
