Upcoming Seminars & Events

Professor P. Andrew Evans
Department of Chemistry
Queens University

Stereoselective Construction of Challenging C-C Bonds and the Development of Antimetastatic Agents

The seminar will explore the development and application of new stereoselective C-C bond-forming reactions in the synthesis of bioactive agents. Specifically, it will highlight a novel dynamic kinetic resolution of a,b-unsaturated aldehydes,^[1] the catalytic asymmetric alkylation of homoenolates^[2] and the development of a concise, efficient and scalable synthesis of antimetastatic agents.^[3]

References

1. (a) Majhi, J.; Turnbull, B. W. H.; Ryu, H.; Park, J.; Baik, M.-H.; Evans, P. A. J. Am Chem. Soc. 2019, 141, 11770. (b) Ma, J.; Li, H.; Majhi, J.; Evans, P. A. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2025, e202520674
2. Wright, T. B.; Turnbull, B. W. H.; Evans, P. A. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2019, 58, 9886.
3. (a) Bhavin V. Pipaliya, B. V.; Trofimova, D. N.; Grange, R. L.; Aeluri, M.; Deng, X.; Shah, K.; Craig, A. W.; Allingham, J. S.; Evans, P. A. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2021, 143, 6847. (b) D. N. Trofimova, M. Aeluri, K. D. Veeranna, Y. Jiang, R. L. Grange, B. V. Pipaliya, M. Subaramanian, A. W. Craig, P. A. Evans and J. S. Allingham, J. Med. Chem. 2024, 67, 5315.

P. Andrew Evans

Professor P. Andrew Evans is the Alfred R. Bader Chair of Organic Chemistry and a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Organic and Organometallic Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at Queen’s University. He is also a Changjiang Scholar at Central South University in China. He received a B.Sc. with honors in Applied Chemistry at Newcastle Polytechnic in 1987 and completed his Ph.D. at the University of Cambridge in 1991 under the supervision of Andrew B. Holmes, FRS. He then pursued postdoctoral research with Philip D. Magnus, FRS, at the University of Texas at Austin as a NATO Postdoctoral Fellow. In 1993, he began his independent career at the University of Delaware, where he was promoted to Professor before moving to Indiana University in 2001. In 2006, he became the Heath Harrison Chair of Organic Chemistry at the University of Liverpool before assuming his current role in 2012. His recent awards include the R. U. Lemieux Award, the Paul G. Gassman Distinguished Service Award, the Harry and Carol Mosher Award, a Changjiang Scholar Award, an ACS Cope Scholar Award and the RSC Pedler Award. He has been actively involved in the ACS Division of Organic Chemistry, serving as a Member-at-Large, Councilor, National Organic Symposium Executive Officer and Division Chair. He currently co-chairs the ACS-DOC Graduate Research Symposium. Professor Evans has held editorial roles as an Associate Editor for Chemical Communications and Synthesis. He is also the former Editor-in-Chief and current President of Organic Reactions. He has published over 150 papers, articles, reviews, book chapters and monographs and has delivered more than 500 plenary and invited lectures.

Hosted by Professor Alexander Grenning

Professor Amanda Morris
Department of Chemistry
Virginia Tech

Professor Carol Hall
Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
North Carolina State University

Alison Campbell Brewer
Eli Lilly
 

Professor Scott Miller
Department of Chemistry
Yale University

Asymmetric Catalysis in Structurally and Mechanistically Complex Molecular Environments

This lecture will describe recent developments resulting from our efforts to develop catalysts for asymmetric reactions, in particular for the preparation of densely functionalized, stereochemically complex structures. Over time, our foci have been on enantioselectivity, site- selectivity and chemoselectivity. In much of our current work, we are studying issues of enantioselectivity as a prelude to the extrapolation of catalysis concepts to more complex molecular settings where multiple issues are presented in a singular substrate. Complex natural products, for example, will be presented as quintessentially complex scaffolds for catalytic modification. Many of the catalysts we have studied are peptide-based, and as such have relied on selectivity that may be traced to decisive multivalent interactions between catalysts and substrates. These mechanistis themes, and their associated ambiguities – especially in light of catalyst or substrate conformational dynamics – will figure strongly in the lecture. Finally, several interesting collaborations – often unanticipated by us – will be discussed.

Scott Miller

Scott J. Miller received his B.A. (1989), M.A. (1989) and Ph.D. (1994) from Harvard University, where he worked with David Evans as a National Science Foundation Predoctoral Fellow. Subsequently, he traveled to the California Institute of Technology where he was a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow with Robert Grubbs until 1996. For the following decade, he was a member of the faculty at Boston College, until joining the faculty at Yale University in 2006. In 2008, he was appointed as the Irénée du Pont Professor of Chemistry, and in 2023 as a Sterling Professor of Chemistry. At Yale, he served as Chair of the Chemistry Department from 2009-2015, and as the Divisional Director for Science from 2015-2017. Professor Miller’s research program focuses on asymmetric catalysis. His group employs strategies that include catalyst design, the development of techniques for catalyst screening, and the application of new catalysts to the preparation of biologically active agents. Several current interests are (a) the selective functionalization of complex molecules, (b) the exploration of analogies between synthetic catalysts and enzymes, (c) the discovery of effective antibiotics despite increasing resistance, and (d) the engineering of the biosynthetic apparatus for nonextant bond-formation. Scott Miller’s awards and honors include: National Science Foundation CAREER Award (1999), Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship (2000), Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award (2000), Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award of the American Chemical Society (2004), Yoshimasa Hirata Memorial Gold Medal of Nagoya University (2009), National Institutes of Health MERIT Award (2011), Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2012), American Chemical Society Award for Creative Work in Synthetic Organic Chemistry (2016), Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2016), Max Tishler Prize, Harvard University (2017), Fellow of the American Chemical Society (2018), Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Invitational Fellowship for Research (2019), Member, National Academy of Sciences (2020), Remsen Award, Maryland Section of the American Chemical Society and Johns Hopkins University (2023), Philadelphia Organic Chemistry Club Allan Day Award (2025), Gabor A. Somorjai Award for Creative Research in Catalysis of the American Chemical Society (2026). In 2024, he was also awarded the Wasserman Prize for Excellence in Teaching Undergraduate Chemistry at Yale University, and in 2026, the Dylan Hixon ‘88 Prize for Teaching Excellence in the Natural Sciences, Yale College Professor Miller has served in number of capacities for public and private organizations. For example, he recently completed terms on the Advisory Council of the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, and the Advisory Council for Center for Scientific Review, both convened by the Director of the National Institutes of Health. He now serves as Editor-in- Chief of The Journal of Organic Chemistry.

Hosted by Professor Courtney Roberts

Professor Scott Miller
Department of Chemistry
Yale University

Asymmetric Catalysis at the Interface of Small Molecules and Enzymes

Asymmetric catalysis has advanced rapidly as a discipline as a result of powerful modalities. Transition metal complexes, organocatalysts and biocatalysts have all played critical roles. Probably critical from the start, and in all three of these approaches to the field, noncovalent interactions are now appreciated to play a decisive role as determinants of selectivity. Peptide-based catalysts have also proven to be a central platform for the systematic study of multifunctional interaction arrays as determinants of selectivity in a wide variety of reactions. Design of new catalytic functionalities has been central to expanding the list of selective reactions and mechanistic paradigms that operate amidst the plethora of selectivity-defining interactions that are now signatures of peptide-catalyzed processes. This lecture will focus on some of the newest developments with peptide-based catalysts, with the goal of placing the work in the broad context of catalysis most generally.

Scott Miller

Scott J. Miller received his B.A. (1989), M.A. (1989) and Ph.D. (1994) from Harvard University, where he worked with David Evans as a National Science Foundation Predoctoral Fellow. Subsequently, he traveled to the California Institute of Technology where he was a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow with Robert Grubbs until 1996. For the following decade, he was a member of the faculty at Boston College, until joining the faculty at Yale University in 2006. In 2008, he was appointed as the Irénée du Pont Professor of Chemistry, and in 2023 as a Sterling Professor of Chemistry. At Yale, he served as Chair of the Chemistry Department from 2009-2015, and as the Divisional Director for Science from 2015-2017. Professor Miller’s research program focuses on asymmetric catalysis. His group employs strategies that include catalyst design, the development of techniques for catalyst screening, and the application of new catalysts to the preparation of biologically active agents. Several current interests are (a) the selective functionalization of complex molecules, (b) the exploration of analogies between synthetic catalysts and enzymes, (c) the discovery of effective antibiotics despite increasing resistance, and (d) the engineering of the biosynthetic apparatus for nonextant bond-formation. Scott Miller’s awards and honors include: National Science Foundation CAREER Award (1999), Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship (2000), Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award (2000), Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award of the American Chemical Society (2004), Yoshimasa Hirata Memorial Gold Medal of Nagoya University (2009), National Institutes of Health MERIT Award (2011), Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2012), American Chemical Society Award for Creative Work in Synthetic Organic Chemistry (2016), Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2016), Max Tishler Prize, Harvard University (2017), Fellow of the American Chemical Society (2018), Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Invitational Fellowship for Research (2019), Member, National Academy of Sciences (2020), Remsen Award, Maryland Section of the American Chemical Society and Johns Hopkins University (2023), Philadelphia Organic Chemistry Club Allan Day Award (2025), Gabor A. Somorjai Award for Creative Research in Catalysis of the American Chemical Society (2026). In 2024, he was also awarded the Wasserman Prize for Excellence in Teaching Undergraduate Chemistry at Yale University, and in 2026, the Dylan Hixon ‘88 Prize for Teaching Excellence in the Natural Sciences, Yale College Professor Miller has served in number of capacities for public and private organizations. For example, he recently completed terms on the Advisory Council of the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, and the Advisory Council for Center for Scientific Review, both convened by the Director of the National Institutes of Health. He now serves as Editor-in- Chief of The Journal of Organic Chemistry.

Hosted by Professor Courtney Roberts

Professor Scott Miller
Department of Chemistry
Yale University

Comparative Catalysis

At the dawn of asymmetric catalysis, most organic chemists viewed highly selective catalysts as rare needles to be found in haystacks. Decades later, excellent catalysts are still hard to define, and to develop. Yet, progress in the field has been rapid, and it is now often possible to find more than one type of catalyst that is effective for a given enantioselective reaction. When that happens, are the catalysts similar? Are similar functional outcomes born of mechanistic homology? Or are there generally multiple mechanistic scenarios that can lead to highly selective catalysts for the same reaction? What lessons for catalyst design may be extracted from comparative studies of this nature? This lecture will present the results of comparative studies of catalysts that are often viewed as privileged to peptide-based catalysts that have been advanced to catalyze similar reactions.

Scott Miller

Scott J. Miller received his B.A. (1989), M.A. (1989) and Ph.D. (1994) from Harvard University, where he worked with David Evans as a National Science Foundation Predoctoral Fellow. Subsequently, he traveled to the California Institute of Technology where he was a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow with Robert Grubbs until 1996. For the following decade, he was a member of the faculty at Boston College, until joining the faculty at Yale University in 2006. In 2008, he was appointed as the Irénée du Pont Professor of Chemistry, and in 2023 as a Sterling Professor of Chemistry. At Yale, he served as Chair of the Chemistry Department from 2009-2015, and as the Divisional Director for Science from 2015-2017. Professor Miller’s research program focuses on asymmetric catalysis. His group employs strategies that include catalyst design, the development of techniques for catalyst screening, and the application of new catalysts to the preparation of biologically active agents. Several current interests are (a) the selective functionalization of complex molecules, (b) the exploration of analogies between synthetic catalysts and enzymes, (c) the discovery of effective antibiotics despite increasing resistance, and (d) the engineering of the biosynthetic apparatus for nonextant bond-formation. Scott Miller’s awards and honors include: National Science Foundation CAREER Award (1999), Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship (2000), Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award (2000), Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award of the American Chemical Society (2004), Yoshimasa Hirata Memorial Gold Medal of Nagoya University (2009), National Institutes of Health MERIT Award (2011), Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2012), American Chemical Society Award for Creative Work in Synthetic Organic Chemistry (2016), Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2016), Max Tishler Prize, Harvard University (2017), Fellow of the American Chemical Society (2018), Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Invitational Fellowship for Research (2019), Member, National Academy of Sciences (2020), Remsen Award, Maryland Section of the American Chemical Society and Johns Hopkins University (2023), Philadelphia Organic Chemistry Club Allan Day Award (2025), Gabor A. Somorjai Award for Creative Research in Catalysis of the American Chemical Society (2026). In 2024, he was also awarded the Wasserman Prize for Excellence in Teaching Undergraduate Chemistry at Yale University, and in 2026, the Dylan Hixon ‘88 Prize for Teaching Excellence in the Natural Sciences, Yale College Professor Miller has served in number of capacities for public and private organizations. For example, he recently completed terms on the Advisory Council of the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, and the Advisory Council for Center for Scientific Review, both convened by the Director of the National Institutes of Health. He now serves as Editor-in- Chief of The Journal of Organic Chemistry.

Hosted by Professor Courtney Roberts

Lafe Purvis
Meta Platforms, Inc.

Professor Dan Huh
Department of Chemistry
University of Rhode Island

Professor Eric Anslyn
Department of Chemistry
University of Texas at Austin