We’re pleased to announce the arrival of three new Master’s students who have joined CiTOS to complete their thesis projects in continuous flow chemistry. This year, we have the pleasure of welcoming Brecht Schmitz, Aurore Quitin, and Soulaimane Oulad Mansour to the team!

Each of them is embarking on a distinct research challenge, while contributing to our broader mission of advancing synthetic methodologies under flow conditions:

Brecht is working alongside Loïc on the development of a flow synthesis platform for hydrazine building blocks—key intermediates for the preparation of essential antibiotics. His project aims to enhance the safety, efficiency, and scalability of this complex chemistry.

Aurore Quitin, mentored by Hubert, is tackling the synthesis of timolol, a ?-blocker used in the treatment of glaucoma. Her goal is to redesign and implement this synthesis in flow, addressing challenges in reactivity and selectivity to deliver a robust and efficient process.

Soulaimane Oulad Mansour is continuing a promising line of work initiated by former members Isaline, Thomas, and Anita. His project focuses on nitrosocarbamates and their application in Diels–Alder reactions, aiming to explore the scope and mechanistic nuances of these reactive intermediates under flow conditions.

We’re thrilled to support their learning journey and look forward to seeing their creativity and dedication shape meaningful progress in the lab.

This spring, we are delighted to host two PhD interns from Italy who are joining CiTOS for a research stay focused on tackling complex synthetic challenges using continuous flow chemistry. Please join us in welcoming Davide Gariboldiand Luca Di Marino!

Davide Gariboldi joins us from the Università degli Studi di Milano, where he is conducting his PhD in the laboratory of Prof. Alessandra Puglisi. At CiTOS, Davide is working on oxidation reactions using potassium permanganate, a powerful but notoriously challenging reagent due to the formation of insoluble manganese dioxide. His project aims to address one of the key bottlenecks in flow chemistry—managing solids—by developing innovative strategies to harness this reaction in a continuous process.

Luca Di Marino comes to us from the University of Salerno, under the supervision of Prof. Irene Izzo. His work at CiTOS focuses on lithiation–addition reactions in flow, with a particular emphasis on scaling up lab-scale experiments to a Corning G1 pilot-scale reactor. Luca’s project seeks to demonstrate the superior performance, safety, and scalability of flow chemistry compared to traditional batch processes.

Benvenuti e buon lavoro!

Meanwhile, in Austria…. JC and Hubert participated in the IMRET17 conference! It was a great conference filled with many interesting speakers.

From CiTOS, JC gave a talk centered around leveraging temperature to intensify reactions for flow. One of the most relevant aspects of the research presented is the development of a priori tools that allow to estimate optimal reaction conditions before experimentation. This work represents the fruit of many years of hard work here at the University of Liège and we are happy to share it with the flow chemistry community at Graz!

Hubert presented his creative automation of a flow system for nitration reactions—developed in-house using accessible, affordable components. This system is part of a US FDA funded project focused on producing essential medicines from biosourced starting materials. The project will be further developed downstream by our collaborators at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Congratulations to Jean-Christophe Monbaliu on the official reception of the Corning International Prize for Outstanding Work in Continuous Flow Reactors & Chemistry. We are especially grateful to have had the honor to host Jiang, Yi, GM of global AFR & AFPT and Basile Giese, PLM & regional commercial director AFR & AFPT, at the University of Liège last week to personally deliver the Corning International Award. The award is beautifully crafted by Steuben Glass LLC in the purest form of glass. Corning’s support has been crucial to the CiTOS’ growth and its impact in research, education and outreach. We hope the entire community will join us in celebrating this great event and look forward to the exciting flow chemistry road ahead

Please join us in welcoming Mathilde, our latest PhD student  at CiTOS!
Mathilde Croissant, a recent graduate from the Ecole européenne de chimie polymères et matériaux de Strasbourg (ECPM), has joined CiTOS to pursue a PhD under the supervision of Jean-Christophe Monbaliu.

Supported by the WEL Research Institute, Mathilde’s research focuses on the application of computational chemistry and artificial intelligence to flow chemistry. Her work here at the University of Liège aims to develop innovative approaches that push the boundaries of modern chemistry through advanced computational techniques.

Introducing Louise Privat-Camblor, new PhD student in CiTOS. Louise is a chemical engineer graduated from École Nationale Supérieure de Chimie de Lille – ENSCL. After completing a master’s degree in medicinal organic chemistry at Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM), she decided to join us to complete her PhD under the supervision of Jean-Christophe Monbaliu.

Supported by the WEL Research Institute, Louise joins the team to develop the link between flow chemistry and process automation.

It’s been a little over a month since BOSSXVIII came to an end. It was a week full of impressive talks covering different areas within organic chemistry. A week with some great poster sessions and great poster prizes! A week with full of wonderful networking opportunities! No need to take our word for it: the feedback poles are in and the BOSS attendees agree!

At CiTOS, we are happy to have contributed to this great conference in organic synthesis. We are proud of our Belgian community of scientists and thankful to the wonderful speakers who joined in to share with the world their most recent advances.

After two years of working towards this conference, the conclusion of the BOSS marks the end of a wonderful chapter for CiTOS and will now remain as a happy memory of a very special week.

We’re happy to have Sergio Barbeira for a short internship where at CiTOS. Sergio  is a PhD student at the University of Santiago de Compostela, under supervision of Professor Martín Fañanás at the CiQUS . During his nearly two-month stay at CiTOS, Sergio will be focusing on expanding his expertise in flow chemistry. We’re excited to have him on board!

#LatePost! June brought two PhD students from the University of Puerto Rico for a short research internship at CiTOS. Nicole and Grecia are part of the team working on the synthesis of APIs from biosourced starting materials. Nicole specializes in the use of process analytical technology (PAT) while Grecia works on the optimization of  synthetic protocols using flow chemistry. Their project is part of our collaboration work with Dr. Cornelis Vlaar and Dr. Torsten Stelzer (University of Puerto Rico) and Dr. Alan Myrson (MIT), with NIPTE and the US-FDA.

They’ve spent the month of June been working at CiTOS, working in close collaboration with Hubert and Loïc and making great progress on the project!

We are very grateful to have had Anita as part of the team during the past two years. It is now sadly time to part ways! Anita has left a wonderful mark on the lab: outreach activities for school children, training of future CiTOS master students, great research in flow photochemistry, and her contagious laughter. We wish her the best in her future work!