Achim Müller

Prof. Dr. Achim Müller
Born	Detmold, Germany,
Nationality	German
Fields	Inorganic Chemistry
Institutions	University of Bielefeld
Alma mater	University of Göttingen

Achim Müller (born in Detmold, Germany) is a German scientist (see categories). He is working now with his research group at the Faculty of Chemistry, University of Bielefeld.

Academic career

Achim Müller studied chemistry and physics at the University of Göttingen and received there his PhD degree (1965) and the Habilitation (1967). In 1971 he became professor at the University of Dortmund, and since 1977 he is professor of Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Bielefeld. His research involves the chemistry of transition metals in synthesis, spectroscopy, and theory with relation to nanochemistry in general, bioinorganic chemistry including biological nitrogen fixation, magnetochemistry, molecular physics and popularised science and natural philosophy. He has published, besides numerous original papers, more than 40 reviews and is coeditor of 14 books. Achim Müller is a member of some leading academies (e.g. Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina) and is recipient of numerous awards (honorary doctor degrees, -professorships and -memberships) and prizes (e.g. Alfred Stock Memorial Prize 2000, Prix Gay-Lussac/Humboldt 2001, Sir Geoffrey Wilkinson Prize 2001, Centenary Lecture of the Royal Society of Chemistry 2008/9, London) as well as named lectureships.

Research

Porous nanosized spherical polyoxomolybdate based capsule: the 20 pores with crown-ether function are filled with guanidinium cations/guests.

His currently most compelling research relates to bottom-up pathways towards tailor-made porous nanoclusters and their use as versatile materials (systems that are now addressed in research worldwide), including:

• multi-supramolecular chemistry on sphere surfaces
• striking examples for a supramolecular/chemical Darwinism
• modelling cation and counter cation transport through membranes
• new solution states for inorganic ions through vesicle formation
• coordination chemistry at the surface, in the pores and in the cavity of the nanocapsules
• encapsulation chemistry in general
• versatile linking in different phases: films, monolayers, liquid crystals
• unprecedented molecular magnets.

Müller's discovery of the molecular giant spheres (keplerates) of the type Mo₁₃₂ (diameter ca. 3 nm), of the wheel shaped cluster Mo₁₅₄ and lemon shaped cluster Mo₃₆₈ (as large as 6 nm) has caused a paradigm shift not only regarding sizes of molecules but also their worldwide use as nanomaterials. These single molecules are quite large; this can be shown by taking the length of an oxygen molecule with two atoms (length 0.12 nm) as a meter, then to place Mo₃₆₈ which is 50 times as large. Müller's recent work demonstrates how cellular processes like ion-transport can be modeled in relation to spherical oxomolybdate capsules. All these clusters belong to a class commonly known as polyoxometalates and some special ones to the molybdenum blue family.

Publications

See either ISI Highly Cited Researchers or homepage (links below); for response to publications see homepage.

Personal

He likes ancient Greek philosophy, classical music and mountain hiking. He has a love for woodland birds since his early childhood, a pastime which had been cherished by his father.

References

• Molecular growth from a Mo₁₇₆ to a Mo₂₄₈ cluster, A. Müller, S. Q. N. Shah, H. Bögge, M. Schmidtmann, Nature, 1999, 397, 48-50
• Self-assembly in aqueous solution of wheel-shaped Mo₁₅₄ oxide clusters into vesicles, T. Liu, E. Diemann, H. Li, A. W. M. Dress, A. Müller, Nature, 426, 2003, 59-62.
• Multifunctional metal oxide based nanoobjects: spherical porous capsules/artificial cells and wheel-shaped species with unprecedented materials properties, A. Müller, S. Roy, J. Mater. Chem., 2005, 15, 4673.
• En route from the mystery of molybdenum blue via related manipulatable building blocks to aspects of materials science, A. Müller, S. Roy, Coord. Chem. Rev. 2003, 245, 153.
• Soluble Molybdenum blue-"des Pudels Kern", A. Müller, C. Serain, Acc. Chem. Res. 2000, 33, 2.
• Mimicking Biological Cation-Transport Based on Sphere-Surface Supramolecular Chemistry: Simultaneous Interaction of Porous Capsules with Molecular Plugs and Passing Cations, A. Merca, E.T.K. Haupt, T. Mitra, H. Bögge, D. Rehder, A. Müller, Chem. Eur. J., 2007, 13, 7650
• Quantum oscillations in a molecular magnet, S. Bertaina, S. Gambarelli, T. Mitra, B. Tsukerblat, A. Müller, B. Barbara, Nature, 453, 203-206 (8 May 2008)

about him :

• From Scheele and Berzelius to Müller: polyoxometalates (POMs) revisited and the "missing link" between the bottom up and top down approaches, P. Gouzerh, M. Che, l’actualité chimique 2006, June Issue, No. 298, 9.
• Inorganic Molecular Capsules: From Structure to Function, L. Cronin, Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2006, 45, 3576.
• Bringing inorganic chemistry to life, N. Hall, Chem. Commun, 2003, 803.

External links

• Homepage
• Laudatio J. Cluster Science
• Geoffrey Wilkinson Prize Appreciation
• Honorary issue of Inorganica Chimica Acta (biography)