Editorial

TL;DR: Professor Lin is a renowned chemist who has made significant contributions to the fields of organic chemistry, natural product chemistry, and chiral chemistry. He has published over 400 research papers and reviews and is known for his innovative research on insect pheromones, biological enzyme catalysis, and chiral drug research.

Abstract: Professor Lin was born in Shanghai on March 7, 1943. He studied chemistry at Shanghai University of Science and Technology and received his bachelor's degree in 1964. He completed his graduate studies under the supervision of Professor Wei-Shan Zhou at the Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry (SIOC) and then began his independent academic career at the same institute, where he was promoted to full professor in 1991. His research interest is mainly focused on the development of new synthetic methods and the synthesis of natural products. He was the Director of SIOC from 1990 to 1999 and elected as an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2001. He has also served as the Director of the Division of Chemical Sciences, National Natural Science Foundation of China (2006–2014). In 2018, he was appointed as the Director of the Institute of Innovative Chinese Medicine of Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Until recently, he remained extremely active, working to elucidate the chemical compositions of traditional Chinese medicines and their synthesis. Professor Lin devoted his lifetime to the research of organic chemistry and has made extensive contributions in the fields of insect pheromones syntheses, biological enzyme catalysis, natural product chemistry, asymmetric synthesis, chiral drug research and chemical education, and is one of the pioneers in the field of chiral chemistry in China. He has published over 400 research papers and reviews and three books. One of the books, Chiral Synthesis, has been a famous postgraduate textbook and widely used as an important reference book by many universities and institutes. His great scientific achievements won him numerous honors and awards including the Ho Liang Ho Li Foundation Science and Technology Progress Award (2006), the National Science and Technology Progress Award (2013, second prize), the Tan Kah Kee Science Award in Chemistry (2014), the Shanghai Science and Technology Award (2014, first prize), and the National Natural Science Award (2016, second prize). Notably, his immense impact to the chemical community is also marked by his outstanding service to the journals Tetrahedron and Tetrahedron Letters as Editor for 27 years (1992–2019).