Rate My Professor Matteo Costantini

Matteo Costantini serves as Assistant Professor in Organic Chemistry at the Department of Chemistry, Stockholm University, a position he assumed in January 2026 to spearhead advancements in sustainable synthetic methods. Hailing from northern Italy, he completed his undergraduate studies in Organic and Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Milan. From 2017 to 2021, Costantini conducted his doctoral research at Stockholm University under the supervision of Dr. Abraham Mendoza in the Department of Organic Chemistry. His PhD work developed innovative synthetic methods for enantiopure cyclopropanes using redox-active carbene reagents, detailed in his 2021 thesis titled 'Asymmetric Synthesis using Redox-Active Diazocompounds as Chiral Carbon Atom Precursors.' Post-PhD, he held a Wenner-Gren Fellowship in Professor Phil Baran’s laboratory at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California, focusing on electrosynthetic methodologies and total syntheses of complex natural products. He later completed a research stay in Professor Miguel Rivero-Crespo’s group at Stockholm University, deepening his proficiency in organocatalytic cascade reactions.

Leading his research group at Stockholm University, Costantini develops methodologies for organic synthesis leveraging electronically unsaturated main-group elements. His approach incorporates single-electron logic to engineer reagents and catalysts that selectively activate inert functionalities, integrating sustainable techniques such as electrochemistry and photochemistry. These strategies facilitate efficient synthesis from unconventional starting materials, including waste streams, with applications in medicinal chemistry, materials science, and catalysis, while probing underlying mechanistic principles for greener processes. Costantini’s impactful scholarship includes 'Overcoming the limitations of Kolbe coupling with waveform-controlled electrosynthesis' in Science (2023), 'General Cyclopropane Assembly by Enantioselective Transfer of a Redox‐Active Carbene to Aliphatic Olefins' in Angewandte Chemie International Edition (2019), 'Modular Enantioselective Synthesis of cis-Cyclopropanes through Self-Sensitized Stereoselective Photodecarboxylation with Benzothiazolines' in ACS Catalysis (2021), and 'Combined Experimental and Computational Study of Ruthenium N-Hydroxyphthalimidoyl Carbenes in Alkene Cyclopropanation Reactions' in ACS Catalysis (2021). He mentors bachelor’s students and fosters interdisciplinary collaborations to drive sustainable organic chemistry.