Johann Gasteiger (27 October 1941 in

Dachau Dachau (, ; , ; ) was one of the first concentration camps built by Nazi Germany and the longest-running one, opening on 22 March 1933. The camp was initially intended to intern Hitler's political opponents, which consisted of communists, s ...

) is a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

Chemist A chemist (from Greek ''chēm(ía)'' alchemy; replacing ''chymist'' from Medieval Latin ''alchemist'') is a graduated scientist trained in the study of chemistry, or an officially enrolled student in the field. Chemists study the composition of ...

and a Chemoinformatician on which he wrote and edited various books.

Life

Johann Gasteiger studied

Chemistry Chemistry is the scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a physical science within the natural sciences that studies the chemical elements that make up matter and chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules a ...

Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (simply University of Munich, LMU or LMU Munich; ) is a public university, public research university in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. Originally established as the University of Ingolstadt in 1472 by Duke ...

ETH Zurich ETH Zurich (; ) is a public university in Zurich, Switzerland. Founded in 1854 with the stated mission to educate engineers and scientists, the university focuses primarily on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. ETH Zurich ran ...

and

University of Zurich The University of Zurich (UZH, ) is a public university, public research university in Zurich, Switzerland. It is the largest university in Switzerland, with its 28,000 enrolled students. It was founded in 1833 from the existing colleges of the ...

. He obtained his PhD in

Organic Chemistry Organic chemistry is a subdiscipline within chemistry involving the science, scientific study of the structure, properties, and reactions of organic compounds and organic matter, organic materials, i.e., matter in its various forms that contain ...

at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich in 1971 with Professor

Rolf Huisgen Rolf Huisgen (; 13 June 1920 – 26 March 2020) was a German chemist. His importance in synthetic organic chemistry extends to the enormous influence he had in post-war chemistry departments in Germany and Austria, due to a large number of his ...

. After

Postdoc A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). Postdocs most commonly, but not always, have a temporary academ ...

at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

until 1972, he was an assistant professor at

Technical University of Munich The Technical University of Munich (TUM or TU Munich; ) is a public research university in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. It specializes in engineering, technology, medicine, and applied and natural sciences. Established in 1868 by King Ludwig II ...

and received his

Habilitation Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in Germany, France, Italy, Poland and some other European and non-English-speaking countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excelle ...

in 1979 under the mentorship of Professor Ivar Ugi. From 1994 until 2007 he was a professor at

University of Erlangen–Nuremberg The Friedrich-Alexander University of Erlangen-Nuremberg (, FAU) is a Public University, public research university in the cities of Erlangen and Nuremberg in Bavaria, Germany. The name Friedrich-Alexander is derived from the university's first ...

in the "Computer-Chemie-Centrum", which he cofounded. In 1997, Johann Gasteiger founded the company Molecular Networks, which distributes software developed at the Computer-Chemie-Centrum. Johann Gasteiger is one of the pioneers of

Cheminformatics Cheminformatics (also known as chemoinformatics) refers to the use of physical chemistry theory with computer and information science techniques—so called "'' in silico''" techniques—in application to a range of descriptive and prescriptive ...

. His main research interest is the development of software for

drug design Drug design, often referred to as rational drug design or simply rational design, is the invention, inventive process of finding new medications based on the knowledge of a biological target. The drug is most commonly an organic compound, organi ...

(for example via QSAR, the simulation of

chemical reaction A chemical reaction is a process that leads to the chemistry, chemical transformation of one set of chemical substances to another. When chemical reactions occur, the atoms are rearranged and the reaction is accompanied by an Gibbs free energy, ...

s, for synthesis planning in

organic chemistry Organic chemistry is a subdiscipline within chemistry involving the science, scientific study of the structure, properties, and reactions of organic compounds and organic matter, organic materials, i.e., matter in its various forms that contain ...

machine learning Machine learning (ML) is a field of study in artificial intelligence concerned with the development and study of Computational statistics, statistical algorithms that can learn from data and generalise to unseen data, and thus perform Task ( ...

for

spectroscopy Spectroscopy is the field of study that measures and interprets electromagnetic spectra. In narrower contexts, spectroscopy is the precise study of color as generalized from visible light to all bands of the electromagnetic spectrum. Spectro ...

, and the application of

neural networks A neural network is a group of interconnected units called neurons that send signals to one another. Neurons can be either Cell (biology), biological cells or signal pathways. While individual neurons are simple, many of them together in a netwo ...

and

genetic algorithm In computer science and operations research, a genetic algorithm (GA) is a metaheuristic inspired by the process of natural selection that belongs to the larger class of evolutionary algorithms (EA). Genetic algorithms are commonly used to g ...

s in chemistry.

Career

In 1979, Johann Gasteiger and Mario Marsili published a method for the iterative calculation of atomic partial charges in molecules. This work is his most-cited publication.Wendy Warr, "In Honor of Johnny Gasteiger", ''honorary lecture at the 2. German Conference on Chemoinformatics'', Goslar, 14 November 2006. Between 1987 and 1991 Johann Gasteiger was a project manager for the development of the ChemInform RX database. Since 1985, the 3D structure generator

CORINA Corina is a female given name of Ancient Greece, ancient Greek origin, derived from κόρη (''korē'') meaning "girl, maiden".neural networks A neural network is a group of interconnected units called neurons that send signals to one another. Neurons can be either Cell (biology), biological cells or signal pathways. While individual neurons are simple, many of them together in a netwo ...

in chemistry. It is mainly his contribution that neural networks are one of standard methods in

today.

Awards

* 1991 ''Gmelin-Beilstein Denkmünze'' of the

Society of German Chemists The German Chemical Society () is a learned society and professional association founded in 1949 to represent the interests of German chemists in local, national and international contexts. GDCh "brings together people working in chemistry and th ...

for contributions to

Computational Chemistry Computational chemistry is a branch of chemistry that uses computer simulations to assist in solving chemical problems. It uses methods of theoretical chemistry incorporated into computer programs to calculate the structures and properties of mol ...

* 1997 ''

Herman Skolnik Award The Herman Skolnik Award is awarded annually by the Division of Chemical Information of the American Chemical Society, "to recognize outstanding contributions to and achievements in the theory and practice of chemical information science". the awa ...

'' of the ''Division of Chemical Information'' of the

American Chemical Society The American Chemical Society (ACS) is a scientific society based in the United States that supports scientific inquiry in the field of chemistry. Founded in 1876 at New York University, the ACS currently has more than 155,000 members at all ...

* 2005 Mike Lynch Award of the Chemical Structure Association * 2006 ACS Award for Computers in Chemical and Pharmaceutical Research * 2006 The 2nd German Conference on Chemoinformatics (also the 20th CIC-Workshop of the Fachgruppe Chemie-Information-Computer of the GDCh) was dedicated to Johann Gasteiger.

References

External links

website at University of Erlangen–Nuremberg

website of Molecular Networks GmbH
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Gasteiger, Johann 1941 births 20th-century German chemists German organic chemists Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich alumni Academic staff of the Technical University of Munich Living people 21st-century German chemists ETH Zurich alumni