Graz
- Wolfgang Kroutil (PI)
- Francesco Mutti
- Johann Sattler
Francesco G. Mutti (= Franci)
Francesco is native of Bergamo (Italy) and he had his education in industrial chemistry at the University of Milan. He started his scientific activity working in the field of bio-inorganic chemistry, synthesizing biomimetic models of copper enzymes capable to reproduce their biological activity. Later on, he became interested in the catalysis using “real” enzymes and he had the opportunity to join the group of Prof. Wolfgang Kroutil. Here, he worked on the biocatalytic alkene cleavage using molecular oxygen and then on the combination of redox metal-catalysts and redox enzymes to achieve chemoenzymatic concurrent cascades. He is currently part of the AmBioCas network, focusing on the asymmetric reductive amination using novel ω-transaminases.
He prefers at the moment testing different transaminases and their substrate scope as well as their preferred amine-donors.
Johann Sattler (= Hansi)
Johann was born in Carinthia (Austria) and he studied organic chemistry at the University of Graz. He joined the group of Prof. Wolfgang Kroutil for his diploma thesis and he learnt how to synthesize sophisticated molecules, which are precursor for C-C cyclization reactions employing the berberine bridge enzyme. He was always impressed by the possibility to combine different classes of enzymes to obtain concurrent cascade reactions. For this reason, he decided to join the AmBioCas group and he is currently trying to combine in a simultaneous process ω-transaminases, alcohol dehydrogenases, Bayer-Villiger monooxygenases and lipases and many more! His ultimate goal is an economically as well as environmental friendly enzymatic pathway to produce highest-quality monomers.