Assistant Professor Wesley Chalifoux has received a prestigious CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation for his research on new methods to make complex organic compounds, such as pharmaceuticals, using new chemical “tools.”

With this CAREER Award, the NSF Synthesis Program supports Chalifoux’s research in the development of new chemical tools for the effective synthesis of biologically active compounds. The new methodology focuses on the application of ynones which are substances that have a carbon-carbon triple bond adjacent to a carbon oxygen double bond. This connection enhances chemical reactivity in bimolecular addition reactions.

“Many biologically active compounds (drug candidates) are too complex to synthesize in a reasonable number of steps and the total cost for companies to invest in them for the purpose of going to market is high,” Chalifoux said. “This has the potential to significantly reduce the step-counts in the synthesis of desirable drug-like scaffolds while also reducing costs to manufacture drugs and reduce waste streams that are generated.”

Chalifoux’s research and proven methodology has allowed him to expand and engage with various research groups and help test them test their own research and other kinds of activity.

“We are devoted to developing new synthetic methods that allow us to efficiently obtain large families of complex biologically active compounds in significantly fewer chemical steps,” Chalifoux said. “The products we can make using our methods are designed to be easily built upon so that we can access a diverse number of structures and allow us to tune or enhance the biological activity.

“We’ve already demonstrated that our methodology works and we are now exploring the diversity of products we can make while also collaborating with industry and other research groups to test their activity.”

Chalifoux joined the Department of Chemistry in 2012.

"The prestigious NSF Career Award is a harbinger of research success,” University of Nevada, Reno Chemistry Department Chair Benjamin King said. “The award provides funding for five years, giving Wesley resources to make his mark in organic synthesis. We are delighted to see his research program advance and eagerly anticipate the discoveries that this award will enable."

The highly competitive Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program awards long duration grants to top junior faculty who exemplify the teacher-scholar model.  Chalifoux’s CAREER Award is the latest in a long tradition of faculty in the Chemistry Department. He joins six others in the chemistry department who have received the NSF CAREER Award.