In this episode, Dani and LC interview Dr. Shane Krska, recipient of the ACS Arthur C. Cope Award, and Dr. Petr Vachal, recipient of the ACS Earle B. Barnes Award for Leadership in Chemical Research Management. Shane shares his pioneering work in catalytic methods and high-throughput experimentation (HTE) for drug discovery, while Petr discusses his leadership role driving innovation at Merck. They reflect on their career journeys from graduate school to industry, emphasizing personal growth and the importance on taking on diverse roles. We wrap it up by asking Shane and Petr what has made them the most proud over their 20+ year careers - which spans from innovations in direct-to-biology for accelerating design-make-test to advancing peptides as a modality of the future!

Read the papers we discussed today:

The Catalysis Laboratory at Merck: 20 Years of CatalyzingInnovation

The medicinal chemist's toolbox for late stage functionalization of drug-like molecules

Highly Efficient Asymmetric Synthesis of Sitagliptin

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This month we sit down with Damien Valette, Olivia Boyd and David Petrone to chat about their latest paper in Organic Letters on the desymmetrization of prochiral dienones to control all-carbon quaternary centers. This reaction leverages biocatalysis, specifically an ene-reductase [ERED] enzymes (which are making their second appearance on the pod - see S1:E5).

David, Damien and Olivia walk us through the discovery of the reaction and why it's uniquely suited to set these challenging stereocenters. This work was done in the context of work at the med-chem/process interface which we explore as well.

Damien and Olivia hail from our London UK MSD site and give us details on the progress of our company's build in the region as well as chat with us about how to be successful when collaborating with scientists on another continent (David).

Read the papers we discussed today:

HTE-Enabled Development of an Ene-Reductase-Catalyzed Desymmetrization: Remote Control of All-Carbon Quaternary γ-Centers ⁠- Org Lett 2024

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Join us on the Pharm to Table podcast for a delightful chat with Ethan Wappes from our South San Francisco site, as we dive into the exciting world of thiophene synthesis! Ethan is a member of our Discovery Process Chemistry group and worked alongside medicinal chemists to devise a better synthetic route towards substituted thiophenes. Ethan shares insights from his recent Org. Lett. on a novel Rh-catalyzed [3+2] method that opens the door to highly substituted dihydrothiophenes, enhancing our medicinal chemistry toolkit. We explore how this strategy not only simplifies complex thiophene syntheses but also paves the way for new drug development possibilities!

Read the papers we discussed today:

Fully Substituted Thiophene Synthesis via (3 + 2) with Thiadiazoles - Org Lett 2024

Follow the Pharm to Table podcast on X - ⁠⁠⁠⁠@PharmtoTablePod

⁠⁠⁠⁠Visit our website at ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/pharm-to-table