Diego Peña receives the ‘Prize for Excellence in Research’ from the Spanish Royal Society of Chemistry

Diego Peña, Principal Investigator at CiQUS, a member of the CIGUS Network, an initiative launched by the regional government (Xunta de Galicia) that groups together centres of accredited scientific excellence within the Galician university system, received recognition for his career and leadership skills during the 2023 awards ceremony of the Spanish Royal Society of Chemistry (RSEQ). On this occasion the panel of judges awarded him the Research Excellence Award.  

In addition to Diego, a further three investigators received Research Excellence Awards from the Spanish Royal Society of Chemistry: Ana Albéniz (University of Valladolid), Igor Larrosa (University of Manchester), and Marisol Martín González (Spanish National Research Council [CSIC in its Spanish initials). During the ceremony held last Friday, RSEQ awards and distinctions were presented in several categories, and there was also a special recognition for members that had completed 45 years’ service.  

In addition to this latest accolade, Diego Peña also holds the Ignacio Ribas Medal, which he received in 2018 from the RSEQ group specialised in Organic Chemistry. In 2020, the researcher received support from the European Research Council (ERC) with an ERC Synergy Grant, in collaboration with Leo Gross (IBM Research Zurich) and Jascha Repp (Regensburg University), to carry out an ambitious project focused on single-molecule manipulation (ERC-SyG MolDAM). Today, his group is continuing to progress with the development of new synthetic methodologies, on-surface chemistry, the synthesis of nanosized polycyclic aromatic compounds and the preparation of nanometric graphenes.