Robert Schlögl studied chemistry and completed his PhD on graphite intercalation compounds at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich (1982). After postdoctoral stays at Cambridge and Basle he carried out his habilitation under the supervision of Professor Ertl at Fritz Haber Institute in Berlin (1989). Later he accepted the call for a Full Professorship of Inorganic Chemistry at Frankfurt University. In 1994 he was appointed his current position as Director at the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society in Berlin. In addition, in 2011 he was appointed founding director at the newly planned Max Planck Institute for Chemical Energy Conversion. Robert Schlögl's research focuses primarily on the investigation of heterogeneous catalysts, with the aim to combine scientific with technical applicability as well as on the development of nanochemically-optimized materials for energy storage. The application of knowledge-based heterogeneous catalysis for large-scale chemical energy conversion summarizes his current research focus.
He is author of about 800 publications and registered inventor of more than 20 patent families. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and member of numerous international organizations. His research activities have been recognized with several international awards.