Christopher has a PhD in Chemistry from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK (1978). He was Postdoctoral Fellow of the Royal Society (1978-80) at the ICSN, Gif sur Yvette, France, with Prof. Sir Derek Barton (Nobel prize in Chemistry 1969). Christopher was also a Postdoctoral fellow 1980-81 at the ETH, Zurich with Prof. Seebach and a Visiting Scholar 1986-87 at the University of California, Berkeley with Prof. Henry Rapoport.

Since 1984 Christopher is an Associate Professor at the Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade de Lisboa (FCUL) and is also Head of the Organic Synthesis Group at the Instituto de Tecnologia Química e Biológica – Universidade Nova de Lisboa (ITQB NOVA).

Christopher has many years of experience in the stereoselective synthesis of bioactive molecules and natural products, reagent development, and the synthesis and bioconjugation of nanoparticles.