Csonka, István
    chemist

Eötvös Loránd University Faculty of Sciences Institute of Chemistry Pázmány Péter sétány 1/A. 1117 - Budapest Hungary     e-mail: csip@elte.hu

• High-school graduation, specialized chemistry class (chemistry teacher dr. Sándor Kromek), Nagy Lajos High School, Pécs, 1990
• M.Sc. Chemistry, Eötvös Loránd University, 1995
• Postgraduate student, Eötvös Loránd University, 1995-1998
• Assistant Professor, Eötvös Loránd University, 1999-2000
• Married :-), 2000
  
• Ph.D. in Chemistry (supervisor: dr. László Szepes), Eötvös Loránd University, 2000
• Postdoctoral fellow, Department of Molecular Biophysics, Deutsche Krebsforschungzentrum, Heidelberg, 2000-2001
• Postdoctoral fellow (OTKA-grant), Eötvös Loránd University, 2001-2004
• Assistant Professor, Eötvös Loránd University, 2004-2005
• Postdoctoral fellow, (OM-grant) Eötvös Loránd University, 2005-2007
• Chemist, Ubichem Kutató Kft., 2007-
  

Research at a Glance

• Recent
• Organic synthesis
  
• API (Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient) synthesis according to cGMP
  

• Past
• Synthesis of ferrocene derivetives of potential biologic activity
• Catalytic activity of modified Wilkinsons catalyst
• Transition metal complexes of carbonyl analouge ligands
• Electronic structure investigations of catalytic transition metal centers
• Applied techniques: ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy (UPS), MS, IR, NMR, inert atmosphere techniques (vacuum line), theoretical chemical calculations
• Electronic structure investigations of carbonyl analouge ligands (isonitriles (RNC), dinitrogen (N₂))
• Amphiphillic catalysis on allyl-palladium compounds
• Mass spectrometry of oligopeptides
• Metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MO-CVD) of hard coatings (SiC, ZrB₂, Cr_xC_y etc.) in thermal reactors from organometallic precursors
• Electronic structure and geometry of silylated hydroxylamines
• Electronic structure and geometry of lambda-4-sulfanes (sulfuranes) and related compounds (sulfides, sulfoxides, sulfones)
  

Periods Abroad

• 1998: short visit at the Department of Chemistry, University of Catania, Catania
  
• 1998-1999: short visits at the Department of Molecular Biophysics, Deutsche Krebsforschungzentrum, Heidelberg
• 2000-2001: postdoctoral fellow at the Department of Molecular Biophysics, Deutsche Krebsforschungzentrum, Heidelberg
• 2004: short visit at the Dipartimento di Chimica "G. Ciamician", Università di Bologna, Bologna

International Relations

• Dr. Béla Paizs, Department of Molecular Biophysics, Deutsche Krebsforschungzentrum, Heidelberg
• Dr. Alberto Modelli, Dipartimento di Chimica "G. Ciamician", Università di Bologna, Bologna
  

Teaching Activities

• Recent
  
• Vacuum technique (in co-operation with dr. Dávid Frigyes; in hungarian)
• Attainment target: Principles and practice of vacuum systems
• Detailed Programme: Basic concepts in vacuum technique. Generation and measurement of rough, high and ultrahigh vacuum. Preparative, high and ultra high vacuum systems. Materials, construction and design. Components and accesories.  Maintenace and troubleshouting.

• Past
  
• Inorganic and Organometallic Synthetic Laboratory Course (in hungarian)
• Attainment target: Preparation of inorganic and organometallic compounds. Synthetic principles and methods.
• Detailed programme: Electrochemical reactions: cathodic reduction. Study of molecular oxygen fixation. Synthesis of metal carbonyls. Reduction by using dissolving metal. Synthesis of organometallic compounds by using anionic alkyating agent. Transition metal "sandwich" compounds. Use of  organometallic reagent in organic synthesis. Preparation and reactions of  transition metal organyls. Transition metal catalysis. Chemical Vapour Deposition. Organometallic photochemistry. Reactions in MW field.

• Inorganic and Organometallic Special Laboratory Practice
• Attainment target: To gain experience in preparations and manipulations carried out at low temperatures, in high vacuum and inert atmosphere (Schlenk technique). Sample preparation of air sensitive compounds by use of dry box. Structural investigations  of the syntesized compounds by multi-nuclear NMR, FT-IR and UPS methods.
• Detailed programme: Synthesis of main group and transition metal organic derivatives. Recording and interpretation of their FT-IR, multi nuclear (1H, 13C, 15N, 17O, 29Si) NMR and UPS spectra. MOCVD of hard coatings. Imvestigation of reactive intermediates. Preparation of mixed oxides and complexes as precursors for metallic and superconducting materials. Determinations of organic and inorganic contaminants in air, water and soil samples.

• Photoionization Techniques
• Attainment target: The course introduces students to the basic principles and applications of UV Photoelectron Spectroscopy. The knowledge provided  can be helpful for graduate and PhD studies as well as for any other fields of professional activity in succession of  university studies.
• Detailed programme: Photoionization and basic principles. Instrumentation. The photoelectron spectrum, factors influencing the band shape. The Koopmans' theorem, interpretation of spectra. Chemical applications of photoelectron spectroscopy. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS),  method based on zero kinetic energy analysis (ZEKE), photoelectron-photoion coincidence (PEPICO).

Supervised Students

• 3  undergraduate research (TDK) theses
• 1 M.Sc. theses
  

Memberships

• Magyar Madártani és Természetvédelmi Egyesület
• Magyar Kémikusok Egyesülete
  

Publications

• Papers in referred journals

1. Benjamin J. Bythell, István Csonka, Sándor Suhai; Douglas F. Barofsky; Béla Paizs: "Gas-phase structure and fragmentation pathways of singly protonated peptides with N-terminal arginine", The Journal of Physical Chemistry B 114 (2010) 15092-15105.

2. István Csonka, Bálint Sztáray, György Tarczay, Gábor Vass, László Szepes: "Szerves fémvegyületek és molekulakomplexek tanulmányozása fotoionizációs módszerekkel", Magyar Kémiai Folyóirat 113 (2007) 7-12 (http://www.mke.org.hu/061mkf/1-2007/7_12_1-2007.pdf)
   

3. István Csonka, Alberto Modelli, László Szepes: "Donor-Acceptor Properties of Isonitriles as Studied by Photoelectron Spectroscopy and Electron Transmission Spectroscopy", Journal of Mass Spectrometry 39 (2004) 1456-1466
4. István Csonka, Béla Paizs, Sándor Suhai: "Modeling of gas phase chemistry of protonated arginine", Journal of Mass Spectrometry 39 (2004) 1025-1035
5. István Csonka: "Geometry and electronic structure of elemental organic compounds", Magyar Kémiai Folyóirat 108 (2002) 34-38 (http://www.kfki.hu/chemonet/mkf/phd3/csonka.html)
6. István Csonka, Béla Paizs, György Lendvay, Sándor Suhai: "Proton mobility and fragmentation reactions of protonated lysylglycine", Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry 15 (2001) 1457-1472
7. Béla Paizs, István Csonka, György Lendvay, Sándor Suhai: "Proton Mobility in Protonated Glycylglycine and N-formylglycyl glycinamide: A Combined Quantum Chemical and RRKM Study", Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry 15 (2001) 637-650
8. István Csonka, Béla Paizs, Sándor Suhai: "Evaluating the formation of salt-bridges: a molecular orbital study", Chemical Physics Letters 326 (2000) 129-142
9. István Csonka, Béla Paizs, György Lendvay, Sándor Suhai: "Proton mobility in protonated peptides: a joint molecular orbital and RRKM study", Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry 14 (2000) 417-431
10. István Csonka, Mária Mörtl, Dezső Knausz, Veronika Harmat, László Szepes: "Geometry and electronic structure of silylated hydroxylamine and carbamic acid derivatives", Journal of Organometallic Chemistry 579 (1999) 38-44
11. István Csonka, István Kapovits, Dénes Szabó, Gábor Vass, László Szepes: "He(I)/He(II) ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopic studies on organosulfur compounds with emphasis on the sulfur-oxygen interaction", Journal of Molecular Structure - THEOCHEM 455(2-3) (1998) 141-159

• Conference abstracts (international)

1. István Csonka, Dávid Frigyes: “Electron impact mass spectroscopic investigation of transition metal isocyanide complexes”, 25th Informal Meeting on Mass Spectrometry, Nyíregyháza-Sóstó, Hungary, 6th - 10th of may, 2007.
   
2. István Csonka: "Electronic structure investigations of transition metal-isonitrile complexes", XVI^th Fechem Conference on Organometallic Chemistry, Budapest, Hungary, 4th - 8th of september, 2005
3. István Csonka, László Szepes: "UPS study on the donor properties of isonitriles", 22nd Informal Meeting on Mass Spectrometry, Tokaj, Hungary, 2nd - 6th of may, 2004
4. István Csonka, Ágota Brányi, László Szepes: "Amphiphil catalytic behaviour of bis(allyl)-palladium-phosphane complexes", XV. Fechem Conference on Organometallic Chemistry, Zürich, Switzerland, 10th -15th of august, 2003
5. István Csonka, Ágota Brányi, László Szepes: "Structure of bis(allyl)-palladium-phosphane complexes", XXth International Conference on Organometallic Chemistry, Corfu, Greece, 7th - 12th of july, 2002
6. István Csonka, Béla Paizs, György Lendvay, Sándor Suhai: "Fragmentation pathways of peptides containing basic amino-acid residues", 19th Informal Meeting on Mass Spectrometry, Noszvaj, Hungary, 29th of april - 3rd of may, 2001
7. István Csonka, Béla Paizs, György Lendvay, Sándor Suhai: "Proton mobility in protonated peptides", 15th International Mass Spectroscopic Conference, Barcelona, Spain, 27th of august - 1st of september, 2000
8. Béla Paizs, Zoltán Szlávik, István Csonka, György Lendvay, Sándor Suhai: "Theoretical study of fragmentation pathways in protonated peptides", 15th International Mass Spectroscopic Conference, Barcelona, Spain, 27th of august - 1st of september, 2000
9. Béla Paizs, Zoltán Szlávik, István Csonka, György Lendvay, Sándor Suhai: "Exploring the mechanism of peptide fragmentation: A theoretical study", 18th Informal Meeting on Mass Spectrometry, Prague, Czech Republic, 30th of april - 4th of may, 2000
10. Béla Paizs, György Lendvay, István Csonka, Károly Vékey, Sándor Suhai: "Formation and fragmentation of Bn ions: an ab initio study", 47th ASMS Conference on Mass Spectrometry and Allied Topics, Dallas, Texas, USA, 13th - 17th of june, 1999
11. Béla Paizs, György Lendvay, István Csonka, Károly Vékey, Sándor Suhai: "Formation and fragmentation of Bn ions: an ab initio study", 17th Informal Meeting on Mass Spectrometry, Fiera di Primiero, Italy, 23th - 27th of may, 1999
12. István Csonka, Béla Paizs, György Lendvay, Sándor Suhai: "Proton mobility in protonated peptides", 17th Informal Meeting on Mass Spectrometry, Fiera di Primiero, Italy, 23rd - 27th of may, 1999
13. István Csonka, Mária Mörtl, Dezső Knausz, László Szepes: "The pyramidal Si-H-N-O skeleton in silylhydroxylamines: a quantum chemical and UV photoelectron spectroscopic study", XII. Fechem Conference on Organometallic Chemistry, Prague, Czech Republic, 31st of august - 5th of september, 1997
14. György Tarczay, István Csonka, László Pöppl, László Szepes: "Structure and decomposition of TiCl4.2L type (L= pyridine, pyrazine, triazine) complexes", XII. Fechem Conference on Organometallic Chemistry, Prague, Czech Republic, 31st of august - 5th of september, 1997
15. György Tarczay, István Csonka, László Pöppl, László Szepes: "Structure and decomposition of TiCl4.2L type (L=pyridine, pyrazine, triazine) complexes", XIII. Magyar Spektroszkópiai Konferencia, Debrecen, Hungary, 29th of june - 4th of july, 1997
16. Dávid Frigyes, István Csonka, László Szepes: "Investigation of s-allyl-p-allyl Rearrangements in Mn and Re Complexes Using He(I) Photoelectron Spectroscopy", XI. Fechem Conference on Organometallic Chemistry, Parma, Italy, 10th - 15th of september, 1995

• Conference abstracts (hungarian)

1. István Csonka: “Isonitrile-complexes of chromium-group”, workshop of the working committee on organometallic chemistry of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Szekszárd, Hungary, 30th of september, 2006.
2. István Csonka: “Organometalic tools:tailoring of ligands”, Annual Meeting of Magyary Zoltán and OTKA postdocs, Debrecen, Hungary, 11th - 12th of november, 2004.
3. István Csonka, Ágota Brányi, László Szepes: "UPS studies on isonitrile ligands", workshop of the working committee on organometallic chemistry of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Pécs, Hungary, 10th -11th of april, 2003
4. István Csonka, Ágota Brányi, László Szepes: "Structure of bis(allyl)-palladium-phosphane complexes", workshop of the working committee on organometallic chemistry of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Keszthely, Hungary, 22nd - 24th of may, 2002
5. István Csonka, Gábor Vass, Dávid Frigyes, László Szepes: "He(II) sugárforrással szerzett tapasztalatok szerves kénvegyületek vizsgálatában" (in hungarian), XII. Magyar Spektroszkópiai Konferencia, Mosonmagyaróvár, Hungary, 10th - 15th of september, 1996
6. Csonka István, Kapovits István, Szepes László: "Orto- és para-nitro-tioanizol He(I) fotoelektron-spektroszkópiás vizsgálata" (in hungarian), XXXVII. Magyar Színképelemző Vándorgyűlés és XI. Magyar Molekulaspektroszkópiai Konferencia, Paks, Hungary, 9th - 12th of june,1995

• University textbooks

1. Csonka István, Kotschy András, Mörtl Mária, Szalay Roland, Vass Gábor, Szepes László: Szervetlen és fémorganikus kémiai gyakorlatok, ELTE Kémiai Intézet, 1999-2011 (in hungarian)
2. Csonka István, Frigyes Dávid: Vákuumtechnika speciális előadás, ELTE Kémiai Intézet, 2004-2011 (in hungarian)