Dr Gadi Rothenberg (1967) has been appointed Professor and Chair of Heterogeneous Catalysis and Sustainable Chemistry in the Faculty of Science at the University of Amsterdam (UvA).

Rothenberg's research focuses on finding and optimising new catalysts and materials for a range of applications in the areas of sustainable chemistry and sustainable energy. Specifically, he develops methods focused on the combination of experimental and computational tools. He was awarded the prestigious Marie Curie Excellence Award from the European Commission (2004) as well as the Paul N. Rylander Award from the Organic Reactions Catalysis Society (2006) for his discovery of catalysts for selective oxidation and C-C coupling. In 2006, he won the Bayer Cropscience Innovation Award in recognition of his new method for monitoring contaminants in groundwater. This latter invention also resulted in a spin-off company, Sorbisense A/S.

Rothenberg has worked at the UvA since 2001 and has led the programme group in Heterogeneous Catalysis since 2005. He began his academic career at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, where he studied applied chemistry and earned his PhD degree cum laude. From 1999 until 2001 he was a Marie Curie Research Fellow at the University of York in England. In October 2003 he was awarded a Vidi grant from The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO). He is co-founder of two companies: Sorbisense A/S in Denmark and Yellow Diesel B.V. in the Netherlands.