Elena Bagryanskaya

THE INTERNATIONAL EPR/ESR SOCIETY

Citation

2021 IES Silver Medal for Chemistry

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Prof. Elena Bagryanskaya 

The IES Silver Medal in Chemistry for 2021 is awarded to Professor Elena Bagryanskaya in recognition of her many and outstanding and fundamental contributions to the application of EPR involving the interactions and reactions of groups containing electron spins.  She has led the development of novel spin labels based on sterically hindered nitroxides, hydrophilic trityl radicals, photoactive porphyrins and new conjugation chemistries. These new labels provide enhanced spectral and relaxation properties for EPR applications. She used these new labels to make pioneering distance measurements in biomolecules at room temperature by pulse dipolar spectroscopy, and has applied them to proteins, nucleic acids and a very complex biomolecular nanomachine – the ribosome. Professor Bagryanskaya’s work on spin-dependent interactions between molecules produced novel breathing crystals. Reversible changes in the crystal morphology (breathing) result from magnetostructural transitions controlled by electron spin interactions. She also developed living polymerization reactions using nitroxide radicals based on her studies of dynamic nuclear polarization and free radical reactions. Collectively, her contributions to the field of EPR have expanded our understanding of the role of electron spin in chemistry and has increased our ability to study the properties of macromolecular assemblies. Professor Bagryanskaya is the author of over 200 publications and is highly active in the EPR community. She is a member of the editorial board of Applied Magnetic Resonance, a member of the ISMAR committee, the former Vice-President of the International EPR Society (IES), President of the Pacific EPR Society (APES), and President of the Russian EPR Society. The International EPR/ESR Society honours Elena Bagryanskaya with the Silver Medal in Chemistry for 2021.