Philip Kraft

Philip Kraft (born in Rendsburg on March 24, 1969) is a German fragrance chemist. Since 1996 he has been employed by Givaudan, a leading Flavor and Fragrance company, where he designs captive odorants for use in perfumes. He has lectured at the University of Bern, the University of Zurich, and the ETH Zurich.

Career

Kraft's interest in fragrance chemistry and perfumery was awakened in 1986 by an article on rose oxide analogs, which led to contacts with Haarmann & Reimer (now Symrise), where he was introduced to the world of scents and fragrances. After graduation from high school and military service which involved forensic and analytical chemistry, he studied chemistry from 1989–1994 at the University of Kiel. He obtained his degree while working in Werner Tochtermann's group, then continued his research with this group, producing his PhD thesis on the synthesis of macrocyclic musks in 1996. Moving to industry, he joined Givaudan's Fragrance Research center of in Dübendorf (Switzerland) in 1996 as the head of an organic synthesis laboratory. In 2001 he participated in an expedition with Roman Kaiser to the primary rain forest of the Masoala peninsula (Madagascar) in search of new natural leads. That same year he was promoted to group leader for the discovery of new odorants. His primary research interests are the rational design of new odorants, molecular modeling, and structure–odor correlations, particularly in the domain of musks and floral odorants. Since 2008 he has taught courses in fragrance chemistry at the University of Bern, the University of Zurich, and the ETH Zurich.