Eric Jacobsen joined Harvard University as full professor in 1993, was named the Sheldon Emory Professor of Organic Chemistry in 2001, and served as Chair of the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology between 2010 and 2015. In 2024 Eric became Associate Editor for JACS. Eric’s research group is dedicated to discovering selective catalytic reactions, and to applying state-of-the art mechanistic and computational techniques to the analysis of those reactions. Several of the catalysts developed in his labs have found widespread application in industry and academia. These include metal-salen complexes for asymmetric epoxidation, conjugate additions, and hydrolytic kinetic resolution of epoxides; chromium-Schiff base complexes for a wide range of enantioselective pericyclic reactions; and organic hydrogen-bond-donor catalysts for activation of neutral and ionic electrophiles. The Jacobsen group’s mechanistic analyses of these systems have helped uncover general principles for catalyst design, including electronic tuning of selectivity, cooperative homo- and hetero-bimetallic catalysis, privileged catalysis, hydrogen-bond donor asymmetric catalysis, and anion-binding catalysis.