Christian Hartinger


Christian G. Hartinger is an Austrian-born New Zealand bioinorganic chemist known for his work in metal-based anticancer drugs.

Scientific career

Hartinger studied chemistry at the University of Vienna, earning his MSc in 1999 and his PhD in 2001 under Bernhard Keppler. He was an Erwin Schrödinger Fellow with Paul Dyson at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne from 2006 to 2008 and obtained his habilitation at the University of Vienna in 2009. In 2011, Hartinger was appointed the position of Associate Professor at The University of Auckland, where he currently serves and in 2015 was promoted to professor. He was also made deputy Head of School of Chemical Sciences in 2013.
Hartinger's research interests are in bioinorganic chemistry, medicinal chemistry, and bioanalytical chemistry, where he uses an interdisciplinary approach in drug discovery. He is specially interested in the development of metal-centred anticancer agents, particularly ruthenium anticancer drugs, and using analytical methods to characterise their behaviour in the presence of biomolecules.
Hartinger has now published over 168 publications and has an h-index of 50.

Distinctions/honours

YearDistinction/honourOrganisation
2005Theodor Körner PrizeTheodor Körner Fund
2006Erwin Schrödinger FellowshipAustrian Science Fund
2009Best Paper Award for the publication Modifying the Structure of Dinuclear Ruthenium Complexes with Antitumor ActivityApplied Organometallic Chemistry
2010Innovative Teaching AwardBank Austria
2010Visiting ProfessorChimie ParisTech, France
2011:de:Carl-Duisberg-Gedächtnispreis|Carl Duisberg Memorial PrizeGerman Chemical Society
2013Visiting ProfessorUniversity of Vienna
2014Scientific Organizing Committee Co-chair7th International Symposium on Bioorganometallic Chemistry
2016Chair of the 8th Asian Biological Inorganic Chemistry Conference8th Asian Biological Inorganic Chemistry Conference
2016SBIC Early Career Award 2016
2016New Zealand Institute of Chemistry Maurice Wilkins Centre Prize
2017Hood Fellowship

Selected research outputs