Luca Bernardi is an Associate Professor in the Department of Industrial Chemistry "Toso Montanari" at the University of Bologna. He obtained an MSc in Industrial Chemistry in 2000 and a PhD in Chemistry in 2004 (supervisor: Prof. Alfredo Ricci) from the same university. Following a postdoctoral appointment at Aarhus University (Denmark) with Prof. Karl Anker Jørgensen, he returned to the University of Bologna, where he was appointed Researcher in 2010 and promoted to Associate Professor in 2014. In 2010–2011, he spent four months as a Visiting Scientist at the University of Groningen (The Netherlands) in the research group led by Prof. Ben L. F. Feringa.
His research activities cover different aspects of modern synthetic organic chemistry, ranging from asymmetric catalysis with small organic molecules to the valorization of marine biopolymers ("Blue Chemistry", in collaboration with Dr. Nathalie Tanchoux, CNRS Montpellier). He has been the scientific coordinator of several industry–academia collaborations and has coordinated the national PRIN2020 project Natural Products-Assisted Organic Synthesis, involving five research units across Italy. He has co-authored more than 100 publications in international peer-reviewed journals (h-index 44; ORCID: 0000-0002-7840-3200; ResearcherID: B-5132-2010) and co-edited the Wiley-VCH book Methodologies in Amine Synthesis: Challenges and Applications. He is also a member of the Editorial Board of the journal Catalysts. He has served as a peer reviewer for numerous international chemistry journals, including Angewandte Chemie International Edition, Chemical Science, ACS Catalysis, Organic Letters, Nature Synthesis, and Nature Catalysis, as well as for several funding agencies, including the Agence Nationale de la Recherche (France), the Italian Ministry of University and Research, and the National Science Centre (Poland).
He obtained the Italian National Scientific Habilitation for Full Professorship in 2012 and 2021, received the Ciamician Medal of the Organic Chemistry Division of the Italian Chemical Society in 2010, and a Pfizer Green Chemistry Bursary Award, together with Prof. Mariafrancesca Fochi, in 2024. He has also delivered numerous invited lectures at national and international institutions and scientific conferences.
Since 2010, he has been actively involved in the teaching activities of the Department of Industrial Chemistry "Toso Montanari", with a particular focus on advanced courses in industrial organic chemistry, catalysis, and sustainable chemistry at the master's and doctoral levels. Since 2018, he has also been a member of the PhD Board of the PhD Programme in Chemistry.
