About the Seminar

Advancing the synthesis of small molecules is critical to the advent of new medicines, materials, and agrochemicals. Our lab has been exploring strategies in chemical synthesis – both in reaction method development and total synthesis – that leverage modern data science techniques. This presentation will share some recent results using informatics to target novel amine–acid coupling reactions, and algorithms to streamline the total synthesis of alkaloids. Chemical synthesis enabled by data science techniques and automation will be a consistent theme of the research.

About the Speaker 

Tim Cernak was born in Montreal, Canada in 1980. He obtained a B.Sc. in Chemistry from University of British Columbia Okanagan and there studied the aroma profile of Chardonnay wines. Following PhD training in total synthesis with Prof. Jim Gleason at McGill University, Tim was a FQRNT Postdoctoral Fellow with Tristan Lambert at Columbia University. In 2009, Tim joined the Medicinal Chemistry team at Merck Sharp & Dohme in Rahway, New Jersey. There he developed technologies for miniaturized synthesis and late-stage functionalization. In 2013, Tim moved to Merck’s Boston site. In 2018, Dr. Cernak joined the Department of Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor as an Assistant Professor. The Cernak Lab is exploring an interface of chemical synthesis and data science. Tim is a co-Founder of Entos, Inc.