Francisco Palacios was born in Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain. He graduated in chemistry at the University of Zaragoza and received his PhD degree from the University of Oviedo in 1977 under the supervision of Prof. José Barluenga. After two years (1979-1981) of post-doctoral work with Prof. Dr. Rolf Huisgen in the Organic Chemistry Institute of the Ludwig University (Munich, Germany), working on cycloaddition reactions, he came back to the University of Oviedo as Assistant Professor and became Associate Professor in 1983 at the same university. Since 1991, he has been full Professor of Organic Chemistry in the University of the Basque Country (Faculty of Pharmacy). He has held visiting professorships at the Ecole Nationale Superière de Chimie of Montpellier (France) and at the Department of Chemistry of the University of Coimbra (Portugal). His research interests are in organic synthesis, organophosphorus chemistry, fluorine chemistry, heterocyclic chemistry, cycloaddition reactions, solid-phase synthesis, the design and development of enzyme inhibitors and drug discovery (cancer and neglected tropical diseases).