Jordi Burés Amat

Jordi Burés Amat

Institut Català d'Investigació Química

Experimental Sciences & Mathematics

Jordi obtained his undergraduate degree in Chemistry and his PhD at the University of Barcelona under the supervision of Prof. Jaume Vilarrasa. He then joined the group of Prof. Donna Blackmond at The Scripps Research Institute in California as a postdoctoral fellow. In 2013, he began his independent research career as a JRF at Imperial College London. In 2016, he was appointed Lecturer at The University of Manchester, progressing to Full Professor of Organic Chemistry in 2023. In 2024, he joined ICIQ, Institute of Chemical Research of Catalonia, as an ICREA Research Professor.
In 2018, Jordi was awarded the Thieme Chemistry Journals Award; in 2019, the Young Researcher Award from the Spanish Royal Society of Chemistry (RSEQ); in 2020, the Hickinbottom Award from the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC); and in 2024, the Bristol Myers Squibb Lectureship (Scripps Research). In 2021, Jordi was awarded the FSE Students’ Award for “Excellence and Innovation in Teaching and Learning Practice”.

Research interests

Our objective is to acquire chemical knowledge that provides a competitive advantage in innovating chemical processes, focusing on mechanistic studies, chemical kinetics, organic chemistry, and catalysis.
We advance mechanistic analysis by developing methods such as Variable Time Normalization Analysis (VTNA) to extract valuable information from reaction profiles and employ machine learning to enhance kinetic analyses.
We conduct experimental mechanistic studies of complex catalytic reactions involving various metals and organocatalysts, impacting industries such as pharmaceuticals, polymers, fragrances, and flavors. Our insights lead to innovative synthetic solutions that offer improved reproducibility, efficiency, and sustainability.
We also collaborate with engineers and spectroscopists to develop advanced data-collection methods and devices that gather high-quality kinetic data, even under challenging conditions, thereby improving reaction profile analysis.

Selected publications

– Procter R, Alamillo-Ferrer C, Shabbir U, Britton P, Bučar D-K, Dumon A, et al. 2024, ‘Borate-Catalysed Direct Amidation Reactions of Coordinating Substrates‘, ChemRxiv. 

Selected research activities

  • Keynote Speaker at the Challenges in Chemical Synthesis Symposium @ Universidad del País Vasco (UPV/EHU), Spain (25/11/2025)
  • Graduated PhD: Mantas Jarockis at The University of Manchester, UK (17/12/2024)
  • PhD viva external examiner: Ivan Ocaña at University of York, UK (3/12/2024)