LEADING THE CHEMICAL COMMUNITY IN ISRAEL

Since 2009 Ehud Keinan serves as President of the Israel Chemical Society (third term). He was born (1947) and educated in Israel, married to Hana Keinan with 6 children and 7 grandchildren. B.Sc. from Tel Aviv University (1971), M.Sc. from Ben-Gurion University (with Leon Zalkow, 1972), Ph.D. from the Weizmann Institute of Science (with Yehuda Mazur, 1977), postdoc at the University of Wisconsin (with Barry M. Trost, 1977-1980). Keinan holds the Benno Gitter & Ilana Ben-Ami Professor of Chemistry, published over 170 papers, 25 patents and 3 books on biocatalysis with antibodies and with synthetic enzymes, organic synthesis, molecular-computing, supra-molecular chemistry, improvised explosives and drug discovery. He received the New England Award for Academic Excellence, the Shannon Award, the CapCure Award, the Herschel-Rich Award, the Technion Prize for security technologies, the Henri Taub Prize for scientific excellence, and the Schulich Prize for the promotion of Extraordinary Academic Activities. Since 2010 he is a Fellow of the ‪American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). He founded two startup companies based on his technologies. He was the founder and first Head of the Institute of Catalysis Science and Technology (ICST) in the Technion. Since 2009 he serves as Editor-in-Chief of the Israel Journal of Chemistry (Wiley-VCH), Member of the Executive Board of EuCheMS, Chairman of the Advisory Council of High School Chemistry Education and Council Member of the Wolf Foundation. He served as Dean of the Technion Schulich Faculty of Chemistry (2004-2005) and Adjunct Professor at The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, California (1991-2014).

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Prof. Michael M. Meijler was born in 1970 in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. He combined studies in chemistry and organic synthesis at the University of Amsterdam with competitive distance running (specializing in 3000 meter steeple-chase). After completing his PhD studies in Bioorganic Chemistry at The Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel with Professor Abraham Shanzer, he joined the group of Professor Kim Janda at The Scripps Research Institute in 2002 as a postdoctoral fellow, and from 2005 to 2006 as Assistant Professor. By the end of 2006, he returned to Israel for a faculty position at the Department of Chemistry at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Be’er Sheva, where he was promoted to Associate Professor in 2011 and to Full Professor in 2015. His research interests focus on chemical communication within and between species and on developing chemical tools to elucidate the molecular mechanisms that guide these interactions and that regulate the balance between competition and coexistence.

Dr. Dorit Taitelbaum completed her undergraduate studies in chemistry at Bar Ilan University in 1985. She received her Ph.D. from the Weizmann Institute of Science in 2009, under the supervision of Prof. Avi Hofstein and Dr. Rachel Mamlok-Naaman, working on Evidence-based chemistry teachers Continuous Professional Development (CPD) during teaching the inquiry approach in the chemistry laboratory. She was a chemistry teacher for more than 20 years, at Shimon Ben Tzvi high school in Givaatayim. Dorit coordinated all chemistry studies at her school for several years, and was also a chemistry mentor for high school teachers around the country. Since July 2011, Dorit is the Chief Inspector of Chemistry studies in Israel at the Ministry of Education. Her main interest is to advance chemistry studies in high school all over Israel.

• Associate Professor, Weizmann Institute of Science – Israel
  • 2017-present, Department of Organic Chemistry.
• Senior Scientist, Weizmann Institute of Science – Israel
  • 2009- 2017, Department of Organic Chemistry.
• Post-doctoral Associate, Yale University – USA
  • 2006–2009, Department of Chemistry (Advisor:  Prof. Andrew Hamilton).
• Ph.D., Weizmann Institute of Science – Israel
  • 2001-2006, Department of Organic Chemistry (Advisor:  Prof. Abraham Shanzer).
• M.Sc., Weizmann Institute of Science – Israel
  • 1998-2001, Department of Organic Chemistry   (Advisor:  Prof. Abraham Shanzer).
• B.Sc., The Hebrew University of Jerusalem – Israel
  • 1995-1998, Field: Chemistry