Professor Konrad Seppelt was born in 1944 in Leipzig, Germany. He studied chemistry at the Universities of Hamburg and Heidelberg, receiving his PhD in 1970 and his 'Habilitation' in 1974 from the University of Heidelberg. Since 1980, he has been at the Freie Universitat Berlin, where he is currently Professor of Chemistry.
Throughout his career, Professor Seppelt has focused his research efforts largely on the chemistry of fluorine. Following early studies of selenium fluorides, he became interested in noble gas chemistry, an area still under active investigation. One of his aims has been to synthesize supposedly nonexistent compounds such as AsCl5, to cite an early example. He has also explored organic fluorine chemistry (CF3OH, cylco-C5F5- and CF3CSF3), solid state chemistry (cesium fluoride intercalation compounds), and organometallic chemistry (structure of nonoctahedral permethylated transition metal compounds). His latest achievement is the isolation of gold-xenon complexes.
Professor Seppelt has received numerous honors and awards in recognition of his research accomplishments, including the Chemiepreis of the G?ngen Academy of Sciences, the American Chemical Society Award for Creative Work in Fluorine Chemistry, and most recently, the 2001 Wilhelm-Klemm-Preis for Inorganic Chemistry from the German Chemical Society. He has also served both as Dean and Vice-President (1992-1995) of the Freie Universitat Berlin.