Abstract

On-surface synthesis offers a versatile approach to fabricating novel carbonbased nanostructures that are unattainable via conventional solution chemistry. Among these nanomaterials, graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) hold a privileged position due to their high potential for various applications. A key challenge in molecular electronics is fine-tuning the electronic properties of GNRs through structural modifications, such as heteroatom doping or incorporating nonbenzenoid rings. In this context, the covalent fusion of GNRs and porphyrins (Pors) emerges as a highly promising strategy.

Biography

Tomás Torres holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry (UAM, 1978, Prof. Fariña). He conducted postdoctoral stay at the Max-Planck Institute for Biochemistry in Martinsried, Munich (1978-1980, Prof. Schäfer) as a Max-Planck fellow, and at the Institute of Organic Chemistry, CSIC, Madrid (1980-1981). He worked at Abelló, S.A./Merck, Sharp and Dohme (1981-85) in Madrid. In 1985, he became an Associate Professor, and from 2000 to 2022, he was a Full Professor of Chemistry and director of the Institute of Advanced Research in Chemical Sciences at UAM (2016-2022). Currently, he is an Emeritus Professor at UAM and a Senior Scientist at IMDEA-Nanoscience.

He has been working in areas ranging from new molecular materials for energy and nanomedicine and currently leads a team of 20 people. Torres has more than 600 publications (34,499 citations) and 49 patents, with an H-index (WoS) of 96 (Orcid ID: 0000-0001-9335-6935). He has supervised 64 PhD Thesis, delivered 390 lectures, and participated as PI in more than 55 projects. Torres ranks 5th among the most cited Spanish chemists in the last 10 years.

He received the Gold Medal of the Royal Spanish Society of Chemistry (2013), the Linstead Career Award from the Society of Porphyrins and Phthalocyanines (2016), and the Miguel Catalán Award from the Community of Madrid (2017). He was awarded the Elhuyar-Goldschmid Prize by the Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker, Germany (2018). He is a Member of the European Academy of Sciences (EURASC) (2017). Torres has been awarded honorary doctorates by Ivanovo University, Russia, in 2009, and Miguel Hernández University of Elche, Spain, in 2016. Recently, in 2023, he received the Humboldt Research Award from the German Research Foundation, and in 2024 the 'Enrique Moles' National Research Prize in the field of Chemical Science and Technology granted by the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities of Spain.