New Year Editorial 2014

Abstract

Curt Wentrup was educated at the University of Copenhagen (Cand. Scient. 1966; D.Sc. 1976) and the Australian National University (Ph.D. 1969). After post-doctoral periods with Hans Dahn (Lausanne), W. M. Jones (Gainesville, FL), and Maitland Jones, Jr (Princeton), he held an assistant professorship at the Universite de Lausanne, Switzerland, and a professorship at the Universitat Marburg, Germany, before returning to Australia in 1985 as Professor and chair of organic chemistry and head of the organic chemistry section at the University of Queensland, where he is now Emeritus Professor. Since 2008, he has been the editor-in-chief of the Australian Journal of Chemistry, and since 2009 chair (now immediate-past chair) of the National Committee for Chemistry of the Australian Academy of Science. He is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science and has published over 300 research papers. His interests are in the fields of both experimental and computational chemistry of reactive intermediates and unusual molecules using photochemistry, flash vacuum thermolysis, andmicrowave-induced chemical reactions; in particular, chemistry of nitrenes, carbenes, nitrile ylides, and nitrile imines, pericyclic rearrangements of cyanates, isocyanates, thioand isothiocyanates, and nitrile oxides and sulfides, and the chemistry of extended cumulenes. He collaborates extensively with groups in Australia and Europe, and frequently holds visiting professorships in Europe.