Rate My Professor Andre Cobb

Professor Andre Cobb is a Professor of Organic Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at King’s College London, part of the Faculty of Natural, Mathematical & Engineering Sciences. He obtained his BSc in Chemistry with a Year in Industry from King’s College London in 1997 and his PhD in 2001 from University College London under the supervision of Professor Charles Marson, developing novel asymmetric organozinc reactions. Following his doctorate, he conducted postdoctoral research at the University of Cambridge, first with Professor Florian Hollfelder in the Department of Biochemistry on the design of synthetic enzymes based on polyethylene imines, and then with Professor Steven V. Ley CBE FRS in the Chemistry Department, initiating organocatalysis projects and contributing to anti-amyloid systems. Cobb is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC) and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (FHEA).

In 2005, Cobb took up his first independent academic position as a Lecturer in the School of Pharmacy at the University of Reading, where he was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2012, earning a faculty research prize for best research output and the 2011 Thieme Chemistry Journals Award. He moved to King’s College London in October 2016. Currently, he serves as Academic Planning Lead, Organic and Biological Chemistry Section Lead, and Advanced Topics in Synthesis Module Lead. Cobb is Associate Editor for the Royal Society of Chemistry’s New Journal of Chemistry since 2016 and Director of the EPSRC-funded Foldamers Network (FoldNetUK). His research focuses on asymmetric organocatalysis for the synthesis of unnatural amino acids, foldamers, medicinal chemistry targets such as antivirals, anticonvulsants, and cardiac medications, and bifunctional fluorescent probes for membrane dynamics and protein movement. Recent grants include a £1.2 million EPSRC Standard Research Grant in 2025 for novel biological catalysts and a £0.75 million EPSRC Network Grant in 2024 for artificial molecules. Key publications encompass “Crystal Structure and NMR of an α,δ-Peptide Foldamer Helix Shows Side-Chains are Well Placed for Bifunctional Catalysis: Application as a Minimalist Aldolase Mimic” (Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 2023), “Development of Bifunctional Fluorescent Probes and their Application to α-Helix Labelling” (Org. Biomol. Chem., 2025), and “Synthesis and Biophysical Characterization of Fingolimod Derivatives as Cardiac Troponin Antagonists” (ACS Med. Chem. Lett., 2024). His work has garnered over 2,470 citations.