Prof. Robert E. Maleczka, Jr.

BS: 1984, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Research Chemist: 1984-1987, Abbot Labs
PhD: 1992, The Ohio State University
Post Doctoral Fellow: 1995, University of Pennsylvania

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Professor Robert E. Maleczka, Jr. was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois.  In 1984 he earned a B.S. in chemistry from the University of Illinois, where he carried out research with Professor Kenneth L. Rinehart.  Upon graduation, he accepted a position with the discovery group at Abbott Labs, working on the development of novel arylfluoroquinolone antibacterial agents.  In 1987, he left Abbott and enrolled in graduate school at The Ohio State University where he studied under Professor Leo Paquette. In late 1992, he moved to the University of Pennsylvania as an American Cancer Society post-doctoral fellow in the laboratories of Professor Amos B. Smith, III.  In the fall of 1995, he began his independent career at Michigan State University, where he currently holds the rank of Professor.  The Maleczka group’s research interests include Green Chemistry, the invention of organoborane, organostannane, and organosilane reactions for organic synthesis; developing new cross-coupling methods; combining catalytic arene C-H activation/borylation with other chemical events; Wittig rearrangements and related chemistry, and the total synthesis of biologically active natural products. Honors bestowed on Professor Maleczka include winning the EPA's 2008 Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge, the Astellas and Yamanouchi USA Foundation Faculty Award, holding the Novartis Lecturer title at Yale University, and the Sigma Xi (MSU Chapter) Junior Meritorious Faculty Research Award.  Chemical and Engineering News named his collaborative studies with Professor Milton Smith (MSU) to be among the Chemistry Highlights of the Year in 2002.  Professor Maleczka’s teaching has been recognized with an MSU College of Natural Science Teacher-Scholar Award and by being named the 1998 Mentor of the Year by the MSU Chapter of Professional Advancement of Black Chemists and Chemical Engineers (NOBCChE).  Among his service and outreach activities, Professor Maleczka has served as a Diversity Scholar at the center for the Integration of Teaching and Learning (Madison, WI) and has been an advisory board member for the MSU Chapter of NOBCChE. He served as the treasurer of the MSU local section of the American Chemical Society from 1996 to 2011 and is currently an elected Member-at-Large of the Executive Committee of the ACS Division of Organic Chemistry. In 2006, Professor Maleczka co-founded BoroPharm, Inc. a company dedicated to the preparation and commercialization of novel aryl and heteroaryl building blocks for organic/pharmaceutical synthesis.  In late 2010, Professor Maleczka became the Chair of the Department of Chemistry.