Coordinator – University of Bucharest – Research Centre for Applied Organic Chemistry, Faculty of Chemistry
Dr. Daniel P. FUNERIU – Project Leader. Dr. Funeriu has a long-lasting experience in organic synthesis as well as chemical engineering. He graduated with an engineering degree in chemistry from European Higher Institute of Chemistry of Strasbourg (EHICS), now Ecole de Chimie, Polymeres et Materiaux de Strasbourg, ECPM. He worked at Zeneca Fine Chemicals in Huddersfield, Great-Britain (on a new synthetic pathway to ibuprofene) and Merck and co, Rahway, New Jersey, USA, on novel synthetic routes to finasteride, marketed under the name of Proscar and Propecia. He was awarded his PhD at the University of Strasbourg, in the laboratory of prof. J.-M. Lehn, Nobel laureate in chemistry in 1987. His thesis focused on the self-assembly of heterocyclic ligands. He developed many new synthetic strategies in heterocyclic chemistry. Dr. Funeriu has expanded his scientific capacities in the fields of peptide chemistry, protein biochemistry, cell biology as well as microarray technologies, as documented by high level independent publications. Dr. Funeriu has previously successfully established his research group at the Technical University Munich, until he was nominated Minister of Education, Research, Youth and Sports in the Romanian Government, resulting in a scientific career discontinuity. His scientific expertise, as documented by scientific publications, includes organic synthesis, peptide and protein (bio)chemistry, in particular: site-specific protein functionalization, peptide/protein self-assembly, active protein/enzyme surface immobilization, design and synthesis of activity-based probes for enzymes of interest, drug-activity assay development, chemical probes for the investigation of interactional maps as well as the use of proteins as building blocks for the construction of polymeric and supramolecular super-structures.
Dr. Mihaela MATACHE is an organic chemist (Ph.D. 2009) with expertise multi-step organic synthesis and abilities to solving issues related to production of various chemicals. Her interests focus on synthesis of nitrogen-containing heterocycles useful in various areas of chemistry, from supramolecular to bioorganic chemistry, as well as development of novel synthetic methodologies and (photo)physical characterization of the resulted structures, solid-phase peptide synthesis and incorporation into chemical probes for protein profiling. Recently, she was also focused on focused on organic synthesis of various small molecules useful as i) novel probes for cell labelling; ii) for construction of novel materials for protein purification; iii) molecules acting as switches or iv) ligands in supramolecular chemistry. Her scientific achievements sum up over 45 papers. She conducted so far two research projects as leader and participated as member in eight others, with diverse topics, highly interdisciplinary, in all having a common role as organic chemist.
Dr. Codruța POPESCU is an organic chemist (PhD 2011) interested in preparation of heterocyclic compounds. Her research focused on synthesis of oxadiazole-based compounds useful as luminescent materials, dual luminescent-paramagnetic probes etc, as well as bis-N-acylhydrazones as switchable molecules, acyloxymethylketones as inhibitors of cysteine proteases or bifunctional chelating ligands aimed for preparation of new solid matrices useful in affinity chromatography for proteins purification. She was involved in 8 national, very diverse research projects with an inter-disciplinary character, combining organic chemistry with biochemistry, molecular biology or physical chemistry. She is the author of 35 publications.
Dr. Mihaela FLOREA (Ph.D. 2003) is holding a senior researcher position and her research activity is focused on materials preparation and their characterization by using different techniques (BET, XRD, XPS, RAMAN, FT-IR, UV-VIS, TG/DTA/DSC, TPR-TPO, SEM/TEM, EXAFS). She is co-author of more than 80 ISI articles, H index 22, and she was participating in FP6, NATO (one project PI), COST projects, national projects (9 projects as PI) and two other international projects as PI underlining her capacity to work in different projects and the implication to finance fundamentally innovative ideas in the different fields. Part of the research studies concerned the structural identification of different materials by using X-ray diffraction technique.
Dr. Anamaria Hanganu (PhD 2011) is an experience researcher and her research activity is focused in the field of NMR spectroscopy. She has strong experience in NMR characterization of a large diversity of organic compounds, polymers, natural compounds, complexes. She was involved in several national projects with an interdisciplinary character, combining NMR spectroscopy with organic chemistry, biochemistry, physical chemistry and physics. Her scientific results were published in over 90 papers (https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0433-752X), Hirsch index 15 with more than 600 citations.
Adela DOBRE – received her Bachelor’s degree (2019) from the University of Bucharest. The B.Sc. thesis was performed under the supervision of Asist. Dr. Anca Păun. The subject consisted in the organic synthesis of new pyrene-based-disubstituted-1,3,4-oxadiazoles, using Sonogashira cross-coupling reaction. She further continued as M.Sc. student under the supervision of Lectr. Dr. Mihaela Matache and Asist. Dr. Anca Păun, performing cross-coupling reactions on thione-based-1,3,4-oxadiazoles and benefited from a research internship at ICOA, Orléans, France. She is currently a PhD student of the University of Bucharest, working in organic synthesis of small-molecules acting as switches, including stable free radicals, acquiring skills in characterization techniques of organic compounds such as NMR, EPR.
Nicoleta SANDU – received her Bachelor’s degree (2020) from the Faculty of Chemistry, University of Bucharest. The BSc thesis was performed under the supervision of Dr. Mihaela Matache. The subject consisted in the synthesis of new carboxylic acids can be used to form new MOFs. She further continued as M.Sc. student under the same supervision, the main research subject of her thesis involving also organic synthesis of various building blocks useful for construction of new materials. She is currently a PhD student in the organic chemistry group, acquiring new skills in organic synthesis and characterisation of organic materials.
Partner – Microsin– the only Romanian manufacturer of active pharmaceutical ingredients (API).
Microsin holds Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) since 2007. In 2009, the first Certificate of Suitability was obtained for Piracetam. In 2011 the second Certificate of Suitability was obtained for Metoprolol tartrate.
Cristian GARBEA – team leader. He is currently the Business Manager of Microsin. He is also a Quality Assurance specialist in the company with extensive knowledge in research and development of APIs. Mr. Cristian Garbea is a pharmacist and started its activity inside Microsin in 2006, in the R&D department. In 2010 he moved to the Quality Assurance Department where he is in charge with the implementation of Good manufacturing Practices guidelines and ISO9001:2015 Quality System. Beginning of 2017 he took up the role of the Business manager form where he manages all the projects inside Microsin.
Dr. Oana Cristina DUTA is a chemical engineer with an experience in R&D of APIs for more than 8 years. After two internships in Research institutes, Ms. Duta started her activity inside the R&D department of Microsin in 2013. She graduated doctoral studies at the Polytechnical University of Bucharest, the Faculty of Applied Chemistry and Materials Science in 2020, focused on development of systems for release and vectorization of biologically active substances with the purpose of obtaining new materials, with improved properties, for medical devices. During her activity at Microsin she successfully implemented synthesis methods for the following APIs that are sold now at industrial scale by Microsin: Xipamide, Phenprocoumon, Orotic acid salts, Alpha Lipoic acid, Timonacic acid, Pridinol hydrochloride, Procaine hydrochloride, Warfarin, etc.
Researcher Maxim MAXIMOV is a chemical engineer with an experience in R&D of APIs for more than 9 years. After three internships in Research institutes, Mr. Maximov started his activity inside the R&D department of Microsin in 2013. During his activity at Microsin he successfully implemented synthesis methods for the following APIs that are sold now at industrial scale by Microsin: Xipamide, Phenprocoumon, Orotic acid salts, Alpha Lipoic acid, Timonacic acid, Pridinol hydrochloride, Procaine hydrochloride, Warfarin, etc. He enrolled as PhD student in 2020 at Politehnica University of Bucharest.