Organic Chemistry Seminar: Professor David Sarlah, Rice University

About the Seminar

"Empowering Organic Synthesis: From Unique Methods to Complex Natural Products"

The talk will include a discussion and analysis of our research at the intersection of synthetic methodology development and chemical synthesis of complex natural products. It will focus on stereodivergent strategies that provide uniform and selective access to various classes of terpenoids, as well as dearomative functionalization, which enables the rapid preparation of aminoglycoside antibiotics.

About the Speaker 

David Sarlah was born and raised in Slovenia, where he obtained his Bachelor’s Degree in Chemistry (University of Ljubljana). He carried out his undergraduate research with Prof. K. C. Nicolaou at Scripps and Prof. Samuel J. Danishefsky at Columbia. He obtained his Ph.D. in chemistry with Prof. K. C. Nicolaou involving the total synthesis of complex natural products. David then joined Prof. Erick M. Carreira's group at ETH as a postdoctoral fellow and explored the field of asymmetric catalysis. In the fall of 2014, David joined the faculty at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and moved to Rice University in 2024. His research interests span from the synthesis of complex, biologically active natural products and the related chemical biology to methodology development.

Host: Noah Burns

This seminar is supported by the William S. Johnson endowment honoring this esteemed chemist, who made significant contributions in the areas of synthetic and bioorganic chemistry.