Leuphana is a young public university that puts emphasis on innovation, rather than tradition. It is continuously aspiring to create a space stimulated by a collective search for knowledge and sustainable solutions. Leuphana’s four scientific initiatives make it possible to incorporate sound specialist knowledge into a more general higher education discourse, and enable the university to carry out research on issues – rather than disciplines. An example of this interdisciplinary education is the unique interdisciplinary extra occupational Master of Science of Sustainable Chemistry program. Involving non-university practical experience from the outset is an important part of our academic culture in teaching and research.
The Chair for Sustainable Chemistry and Material Resources is a multidisciplinary research group associated with the Faculty of Sustainability at the Leuphana University of Lüneburg and is world leading in the topics of Sustainable Chemistry and Sustainable Pharmacy but has also a long standing international highly acknowledged experience in environmental chemistry with a focus on water pollution. The group’s research focuses on sustainability in the context of the life cycle of chemical substances, covering also issues of raw materials, their synthesis, their application as well as their fate after use. In particular, the associated process of developing environmentally benign molecules applying in silico and experimental methods is one of the group’s core competences, as recently demonstrated by the development of the more environmentally benign fluoroquinolone antibiotic CIP-Hemi and a series of greener ionic liquids. The institution has lab-infrastructure for state-of-the-art analytical chemistry (including HRMS), bio- and photo degradation testing, algae and bacterial toxicity, mutagenicity and cell toxicity and genotoxicity. Hard- and software for computational chemistry (physico-chemical properties, biodegradability, toxicity (about 30 different endpoints including mutagenicity assessment according to ICH M 7 guidelines for mutagenicity) and fate modelling of aquatic pollutants and transformation products are state-of-the-art and available.
Role in the project
Leuphana is overseeing the development of environmentally benign fluoroquinolone antibiotics (WP2) and is responsible for assessing the most promising new molecules.
