Dr. Johannes Grosskopf

B.Sc., Technical University of Munich, 2017

M.Sc., Technical University of Munich and UC San Diego, 2019

Ph.D., Technical University of Munich, 2023

Johannes was born and raised in the beautiful Bavarian countryside, just a few miles away from Albert Einstein’s birthplace. For his Bachelor studies, he wanted to move to a “big” city and therefore moved to Munich, the home of the Oktoberfest, to study chemistry at the Technical University of Munich. Always fascinated by traveling and living in different countries, he decided to spend a significant part of his Master’s overseas in sunny California at UC San Diego. Later, he completed a research stay in the group of Prof. Ruben Martin at the ICIQ in Tarragona, Spain, where he worked on nickel-catalyzed olefin functionalizations. During his Master’s thesis, he discovered his passion for organic photochemistry and pursued his Ph.D., focusing on the development of photochemical deracemization reactions under the supervision of Prof. Thorsten Bach at TU Munich. Deciding that it was time to have a look at the east coast, Johannes joined the MacMillan lab as a postdoc in September 2023. Outside of the lab, he enjoys various mountain activities, including skiing and hiking, as well as running (albeit at a slow pace) and going to the gym.

Fun Facts

• Johannes loves everything that is related to dogs and dreams about having at least 3 of them, or more if possible.
• One winter, he and his friends hit the slopes every weekend for a total of 20 days and still couldn't get enough. In the end, they even memorized all the slope plans by heart.
• If you want to start a conversation with Johannes, there are three things that always work: all things related to chemistry, his family's Labrador, and Taylor Swift.
• One summer he dyed his hair blond (some would say slightly blue) to try something new and still insists that it looked good.