Advanced Training
ICIQ has a strong commitment to offer training programmes for undergraduates, graduate students and doctoral researchers. We prepare a new generation of researchers with the skills and knowledge needed to tackle the most important challenges in chemical research. We are convinced that an integral education beyond chemistry is crucial to achieve outstanding research results and fruitful life achievements.
Training Programmes
The ICIQ Graduate Student Programme ICIQ’s PhD student programme is at the core of our commitment to education. We foster graduate students in their path to think, design and execute a research project under the supervision and mentoring of an ICIQ Group Leader. The programme targets highly qualified and talented graduate students with an enthusiastic interest in chemical research and has been successful in attracting students from all over the world.
In 2018 we launched four calls of our PhD Fellowship Programme. A total of 17 graduate students joined ICIQ through ICIQ’s fellowship programme. We also incorporated PhD students through other funding calls: 2 FI (AGAUR); 1 FPU (MECD); 1 Estancias breves FPU(MECD); 5 FPI (MICIU), 2 INPhINIT (Fundació Bancària La Caixa) and 2 PREBIST (BIST).
PhD theses defended in 2018
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| Date | Name | Thesis title | Supervisors |
|---|---|---|---|
| 01.03 | Eduardo C. Escudero | High resolution X-Ray Single Crystal Diffraction | Prof. Pau Ballester / Dr. Jordi Benet |
| 15.03 | Shoulei Wang | Approaches to Asymmetric Catalysis Mediated by Polymer-Supported and Homogeneous Organocatalysts | Prof. Miquel À. Pericàs |
| 21.03 | Rohit Gaikwad | Carbon Dioxide to Methanol: Stoichiometric Catalytic Hydrogenation under High Pressure Conditions | Prof. Atsushi Urakawa |
| 22.03 | Sergio Sopeña | Organocatalytic Transformations of Carbon Dioxide and Cyclic Carbonates | Prof. Arjan Kleij |
| 22.03 | Marcos Rellán | Molybdenum Oxides as Catalyst for Biomass-Derived Compounds: a Theoretical Approach | Prof. Núria López |
| 12.04 | Lidia Clot | Immobilization of Chiral Brønsted Acids and Lewis Base for Batch and Flow Enantioselective Catalysis | Prof. Miquel À. Pericàs |
| 30.05 | Eloísa Serrano | Amide Formation via Ni-Catalyzed Reductive Coupling Reactions with Isocyanates | Prof. Rubén Martín |
| 07.09 | Belén García | Novel Halogen(I) Reagents in the Csp2- and Csp3-Bond Functionalization | Prof. Kilian Muñiz |
| 14.09 | Elena de Orbe | Gold-Catalyzed Intermolecular Reactions of Alkynes with Alkenes: Novel Reactivities and Global Mechanistic Picture | Prof. Antonio M. Echavarren |
| 09.10 | Joan González | Computational Design of Catalysts for Carbon Dioxide Recycling | Prof. Carles Bo |
| 15.10 | Yuanyuan Shi | Materials and Molecules for Pollution Free Clean Energy | Prof. Antoni Llobet |
| 18.10 | Sofia Ferrer Cabrera | Gold Catalysis: From Fundamentals to the Synthesis of Bullvalenes and Naturally Occurring Sesquiterpenes | Prof. A. M. Echavarren |
| 25.10 | Marta Borges Ordoño | Insights into the co-catalyst effects in light-driven reactions for water splitting and carbon dioxide reduction | Prof. Atsushi Urakawa |
| 29.10 | Luca Buzzetti | Photochemical Strategies for Carbon-Carbon Bond Forming Processes | Prof. Paolo Melchiorre |
| 02.11 | Pablo Garrido Barros | Molecular Water Oxidation Catalysts Based on Copper and Nickel Complexes | Prof. Antoni Llobet |
| 12.11 | Yangyang Shen | Visible Light Photoredox Promoted Transformations of Inert Chemical Bonds | Prof. Rubén Martín |
| 20.11 | Santiago Cañellas | Smart Catalytic Systems for Batch and Continuous Flow Enantioselective Processes | Prof. Miquel À. Pericàs |
| 29.11 | Xiang Yin | Synthesis of Indenes and Indanes by Gold(I)-Catalyzed Decarbenation | Prof. Antonio M. Echavarren |
Postdoctoral researchers at ICIQ have an outstanding opportunity to develop their research career in a collaborative and international environment. We believe in empowering postdoctoral researchers and strengthening their leadership skills. In 2018 we succeeded in obtaining eight Marie Curie Sklodowska Actions – Individual Fellowships (MSCA-IF) grants. Moreover, ICIQ benefited from two Beatriu de Pinós (AGAUR); three Juan de la Cierva (MICIU) and five postdoctoral grants from the COFOUND programme PROBIST (BIST).
We participated in two Master programmes. The URV/ICIQ Master in Synthesis, Catalysis and Molecular Design provides scientific training in the design of new methods of synthesis, development of catalysts, computational design and management of environmentally friendly chemical processes. The Master also focuses on providing the skills needed to address research and development tasks and innovative activities in the industry. Four ICIQ Master students were awarded one of the institute’s master projects fellowships. We also participated in the Master of Multidisciplinary Research in Experimental Sciences (BIST-UPF), which provides in-depth hands-on research training in multiple fields. Students undertake a 6-month major project, and a 10-week minor project in two different research disciplines in different BIST centers.
ICIQ Summer Internship Programme brings together outstanding undergraduate students who make the most of their Summer holidays by working in one of ICIQ’s research groups during the months of July, August and September. In 2018, ten students from different countries were awarded one of our summer fellowships to carry out research projects in several groups at the centre. Since 2011, 24 summer fellows have joined ICIQ to carry out master or doctoral studies.
The ICIQ Summer Fellowships Programme is sponsored by Fundació Bancària La Caixa.
Transferable Skills Courses
| TRAINING COURSE NAME | AUDIENCE | DATE | OBJECTIVES | PROVIDER |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| How to be an effective researcher | New PhD students | 16/01/2018 19/01/2019 | Enhance the effectiveness of postgraduate researchers by providing them with an opportunity to build their understanding, skills and confidence in communication, planning and time management, problem solving, leadership and assertiveness. Help researchers to have a greater self-awareness of learning and working styles. | Vitae - BIST |
| Volumetric Physisorption Seminar | ICIQ researchers | 18/01/218 | The aim of the workshop is to give support to users of the Autosorb iQ (from Quantachrome) equipment. | Internal (Georgiana Stoica) |
| Managing myself & working with my team | Postdoctoral researchers | 22/01/2018 23/01/2018 | Develop a conceptual framework to understand and deal with some of the most common challenges that postdocs face. Acquire a set of practical tools and methods that are immediately applicable in the participants’ working environment. | The Papermill |
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| TRAINING COURSE NAME | AUDIENCE | DATE | OBJECTIVES | PROVIDER |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CG-MS Tips and Tricks | ICIQ researchers | 25/01/18 | The workshop is devoted to practical aspects of gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry detection. | Agilent & ICIQ |
| Heterogeneous Catalysis Unit Seminar | ICIQ researchers | 22/02/18 | The aim of the workshop is to give support to the users of the EMX Micro EPR (from Bruker) equipment. | Internal (Georgiana Stoica) |
| Effective presentations | Project researchers | 18/04/2018 | The aim of this workshop is to improve the oral communication competence, for preparing better presentations | Adecco Formación |
| Leadership in Action | Postdoctoral researchers | 11/04/2018 13/04/2018 | This workshop allows researchers to explore and develop their leadership skills. Participants have the opportunity to look at relevant theory, to practice their unique leadership styles and to receive feedback. | Vitae - BIST |
| RSA general overview | New researchers | 05/02/18 29/10/18 | Regular sessions for new researchers about ICIQ instrumentation facilities. | Internal (Gisela Colet) |
| IP Management at ICIQ | ICIQ researchers | 09/05/18 | Introduce the existing forms of IP titles and the way IP is managed at ICIQ. | Internal (Fred Ratel) |
| Valorization of R&D results | ICIQ researchers | 16/05/18 | Provide ICIQ researchers with knowledge about the key aspects to be taken into account when considering commercializing R&D results. | Arvor Consulting |
| MSCA Individual Fellowship Workshop | PhD 4 year and postdocs | 18/05/18 | Help PhD students in their last year or postdoctoral researchers interested in applying for a Marie Skłodowska Curie Individual Fellowship. | Internal (Projects Department – Lorena Tomás, Anna Banet, Laura López) |
| Introduction to Research Integrity | 21/05/18 | Provide knowledge about key aspects for a responsible conduct of research. | Maruxa Martínez (PRBB) | |
| How to survive a PhD | New PhD students | 23/05/18 | Enhance the effectiveness of the new PhD students by providing them with an opportunity to improve the following skills: communication, teambuilding, conflict resolution, time management, project management, and creativity. | Internal (HR Unit) |
| Python for researchers | ICIQ researchers | 04/06/18 08/06/18 | Phyton is a must-have technique that will allow the course participants to reuse and share code easily. | UB professors: Fermí Huarte & Ramon Crehuet |
| From science to business | BIST researchers | 12/06/18 14/06/18 | Provide researchers with the tools to launch a new business exploiting scientific or technical knowledge. | ESADE - BIST |
| GRADSCHOOL BIST | PhD students | 04/07/18 06/07/18 | GRADschools are experiential learning courses designed to develop the transferable skills of postgraduate researchers. Many researchers who attend the course have a transformational experience, empowered to take charge of their own learning and career. | Vitae – ICIQ - BIST |
| RMN workshop | ICIQ researchers | 18/07/18 | Present of all NMR resources available in the intranet. | Internal (Gabriel González) |
| Leadership and management skills for senior postdocs | Postdoctoral researchers | 03/10/18 05/10/18 | Improvement of collaboration and (self) organizational skills. Learn and practice useful tools to advance in the career in science and be encouraged to establish and maintain a peer support group. | HFP Consulting - BIST |
| Leadership and management skills for senior PI | Group leaders | 08/10/18 10/10/18 | Aimint at improve the communication, collaboration and leadership skills; at provide useful tools for balancing the roles of manager, leader, scientist; conflict resolution. and negotiation; acquire skills in order to make and communicate hard decisions; and analyze how to actively shape the culture of science at their institution. | HFP Consulting - BIST |
| Data visualization | BIST researchers | 11/10/18 | Provide participants with an accessible and comprehensive introduction to visualize your scientific ideas and help your audience effortlessly grasp the essence of your research. | |
| Mass Spectrometry seminar | ICIQ researchers | 03/05/18 25/09/18 | The seminar was focused on the following topics: basic aspects of mass spectrometry and guidelines to be followed by all MS Unit users | Internal (Noemi Cabello) |
| Fundamentals of Fluorescence | ICIQ researchers | 03/10/18 | This talk introduces basic concepts of Uv-Vis absorption spectroscopy and fluorescence measurements. | Internal (Fernando Bozoglian & Javier Pérez) |
| Introduction to Electron Paramagnetic Resonance | ICIQ researchers | 08/11/18 | This workshop is planned to give support to the users of the EMX Micro EPR (from Bruker) equipment. | Internal (Georgiana Stoica) |
| Crystallization protocol seminar | ICIQ researchers | 28/11/18 | Explain different techniques you can use to obtain single crystals of your compounds. At the end of the seminar a few crystallization experiments starting from the melt will be performed. | Internal (Jordi Benet) |