Etcetera

Paper by Boger Lab Ranked Best in 2012 by Organic Letters

A paper detailing ongoing research on the synthesis of vinblastine analogues in the lab of Dale Boger, chair of the Department of Chemistry at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI), has been selected by the publishers as the best of those appearing in Organic Letters during 2012.

Vinblastine and vincristine represent one of the earliest and most important contributions that plant-derived natural products have made to cancer chemotherapy.

In addition to Boger, the paper, titled “Iron(III)/NaBH4-Mediated Additions to Unactivated Alkenes: Synthesis of Novel 200-Vinblastine Analogues,” (Vol. 14, No. 6, 1428-1431) was authored by Erick K. Leggans (now at Grinnell College in Iowa), Research Associate Timothy J. Barker and graduate student Katharine K. Duncan.

Boger will present the paper and related efforts at a symposium during the National American Chemical Society Meeting in Indianapolis next fall.

Kanny Wan Selected to Attend Meeting with Nobel Laureates

The Scripps Research Institute’s (TSRI) Kanny Wan is one of just 550 graduate students worldwide selected to attend the 63^rd Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting, an international forum of Nobel scientists and the next generation of leading scientists and researchers.

Established in 1951, the Lindau Meeting program features lectures, discussion sessions, master classes, panel discussions and informal encounters to facilitate scientific exchange between generations, disciplines, and nationalities. Thirty-five Nobel Prize winners will attend the week-long 2013 meeting, scheduled for this summer in Lindau, Germany. The meeting will focus on green chemistry and biochemical processes and structures.

Wan, who is a member of the Shenvi lab at TSRI, is currently working on the total syntheses of a family of complex marine terpenoids that exhibit selective cytotoxicity against several lines of human cancer cells. She received a travel award from the National Science Foundation’s Mathematical and Physical Science Directorate to attend the Lindau Meeting.

Send comments to: mikaono[at]scripps.edu

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Etcetera

Paper by Boger Lab Ranked Best in 2012 by Organic Letters

Kanny Wan Selected to Attend Meeting with Nobel Laureates