Gretchen R. Stanton, a 2006 Undergraduate Fellow and a 2009 Graduate Fellow, was highlighted in C&EN for her presentation at the annual meeting of the Americal Chemical Society in the March 29, 2010 issue. Gretchen has worked out a new reaction pathway which allows more efficient production of chiral centers. These reactions are very important in the synthesis of pharmceuticals. Using zinc reagents, Gretchen was able to circumvent the rules that govern additions to chiral carbonyl ompounds. This process offers an alternative approach using two achiral zinc reagents, a dialkyl zinc nucleophile and an alkylzinc halide Lewis acid. This work was also published in the Journal of the Americal Chemical Society as well as being presented at the annual meeting in a symposium sponsored by the ACS Division of Organic Chemistry.
Gretchen first became a Fellow while attending the University of California-Davis as a chemistry major. She worked in medicinal chemistry at the Merck Research Laboratories during her two summer internships in 2006 and 2007. She then went on to join the graduate program at the University of Pennsylvania in 2007 and joined the laboratory of Dr. Patrick Walsh where she engaged in this ground breaking work. In the C&EN article, Gretchen was quoted as saying "To be working on something that could affect what's in textbooks is very exciting."
Congratulations, Gretchen, from all of the UNCF/Merck Fellows on your excellent accomplishments. "Once a Fellow - Always a Fellow."