Dean’s Chair Professor, National University of Singapore

Research areas: Base Metal Catalysis; Radical Cross-Coupling; Sustainable Chemical Synthesis

Award Citation: The AYSF Committee acknowledges his achievements in base metal catalyzed alkene/alkyne functionalizations and glycosyl radical functionalizations and would like to support his exploration in catalytic skeletal editing transformations to create new functional molecules.

Bio: Ming Joo (MJ) Koh is currently a Dean’s Chair Professor in the Department of Chemistry at the National University of Singapore. His research focuses on developing sustainable and practical catalytic solutions that address critical challenges in chemical synthesis through base metal catalysis and radical cross-coupling chemistry. In particular, MJ has made contributions in the areas of directing-group-free alkene functionalization, protecting-group-free radical glycosylation and catalytic skeletal editing to simplify organic synthesis. His findings were published in top scientific journals such as Nature, Nature Catalysis and Nature Chemistry. He has received a number of research awards including the Innovators Under 35 (TR35) Asia Pacific Award (2021), TCI-SNIC Industry Award in Synthetic Chemistry (2021), C&EN’s Talented 12 Award (2022), Novartis Early Career Award in Chemistry (2023) and Mitsui Chemicals Catalysis Science Award for Creative Work (2024).

Personal Web: www.mjkohgroup.com