On the afternoon of August 16, 2026, at the invitation of the College of Chemistry and Materials Science, Professor Makoto Yamashita from Institute of Science Tokyo visited our university and delivered an academic lecture titled “Synthesis and Properties of Aluminum-Containing Intermetallic Bonds” in Room 302 of Huayu Building. Faculty members and graduate students from the College attended the lecture and engaged in discussions with the speaker.

 

Professor Makoto Yamashita is currently a full professor in the Department of Chemistry, School of Science, at Institute of Science Tokyo. He received his Ph.D. from Hiroshima University and has held faculty positions at the University of Tokyo (lecturer), Chuo University, and Nagoya University (professor), as well as visiting scientist positions at the University of Würzburg and the University of Bonn. In recognition of his outstanding contributions to chemistry, Professor Yamashita has received numerous prestigious awards, including the Humboldt Research Award (2024), the Chemical Society of Japan Award for Creative Work (2023), the JSPS Prize (2020), and the Young Scientist Award from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan.

Professor Yamashita’s research interests focus on the design and synthesis of boryl and alumanyl anions, electron-deficient diboranes, and the organometallic chemistry of boron-containing pincer ligands. Through precise molecular design and synthetic strategies, his group has discovered numerous unusual chemical structures and reaction patterns, opening new frontiers in main-group element chemistry. His research outcomes have been published in top-tier journals such as Science, Nature Chemistry, Journal of the American Chemical Society, and Angewandte Chemie International Edition, providing important theoretical and experimental foundations for understanding and expanding the role of main-group elements in modern synthetic chemistry.

The lecture centered on the synthesis and properties of aluminum-containing intermetallic bonds. Professor Yamashita’s team systematically presented their latest original achievements in the chemistry of early transition metal–aluminum and main-group metal–aluminum complexes, based on transmetalation reactions between aluminum anions and metal halides. By designing novel alumanyl anion precursors and optimizing transmetalation reaction conditions, the team successfully constructed a series of structurally novel aluminum–transition metal and aluminum–main-group metal bonded complexes. Through single-crystal X-ray diffraction, spectroscopic characterization, and theoretical calculations, they thoroughly elucidated the bonding nature and electronic structures of these metal–aluminum bonds. This work not only enriches the library of main-group–metal bond chemistry but also opens new avenues for exploring the application of aluminum-ligated complexes in small-molecule activation and catalysis.

After the lecture, Professor Yamashita engaged in in-depth discussions and exchanges with faculty and students, providing detailed answers to their questions. The audience greatly benefited from the presentation, and the academic event was a resounding success.