UC Berkeley, Dept of Chemistry - Jonathan A. Ellman

Chemistry Faculty

Jonathan A. Ellman

Professor of Chemistry

email: jellman@berkeley.edu
office: 826 Latimer
phone: 510.642.4488

Research Interests

Organic Chemistry and Chemical Biology — New strategies in organic synthesis are being developed to solve problems in chemistry and biology.

Professor Ellman's group is focused on three major areas of chemistry development: (I) The development of robust, general and efficient methods for the asymmetric synthesis of amine-containing compounds. (II) The application of C-H bond activation methods to the rapid construction of complex, bioactive structures. (III) The application of chemistry to systematically characterize biological systems to advance the treatment of disease.

(I) Asymmetric Synthesis of Amines: The Ellman group has developed practical and general methods for the asymmetric synthesis of amines, which are among the most important functionalities present in drugs. The methods that they have developed are now extensively used in academics and industry. In addition to continued methods development, the Ellman group is also currently applying their methods to the synthesis of complex, bioactive natural products and drug candidates.
(II) Application of C-H Activation to Organic Synthesis: C-H bond activation followed by carbon-carbon bond formation will become one of the most important new methods in synthesis due to the high functional group tolerance of the chemistry and due to virtually unlimited substrate availability. However, despite the vast potential of this approach, relatively few synthetic methods based upon C-H activation have been developed. Over the past several years the Ellman and Bergman groups have collaborated to develop efficient new synthetic methods based upon C-H activation chemistry, and they are applying this chemistry to the efficient synthesis of complex natural products and drug candidates.
(III) Application of Chemical Tools to Study Biological Systems: The Ellman group has developed powerful chemical tools to systematically establish the function of proteases, which play a critical role in regulating a majority of biological processes, including cell differentiation, blood coagulation, the life cycles of bacterial, parasitic and viral pathogens, and apoptosis. The chemical tools that the Ellman group has developed have been broadly applied by academic and industrial researchers to elucidate the biological function of newly identified proteases. The Ellman group also continues to make significant contributions to the development of potent protease inhibitors with an emphasis towards proteases implicated in third world disease.

Biography

Professor, born 1962; B.S. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1984); Ph.D. Harvard University (1989); NSF Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California, Berkeley (1992). Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship (1994-1996); Eli Lilly Grantee Award (1994-1996); Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award (1994-1997); Burroughs Wellcome Fund 1993 George Herbert Hitchings Award for Drug Design and Discovery (1993-1997); Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation Young Investigator Award (1993-1995); National Science Foundation Young Investigator Award (1993-1995); UC, Berkeley Department of Chemistry Teaching Award (1998); American Chemical Society Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award (2000); Society of Biomolecular Screening Achievement Award (2003); Scheele Award selected by the Swedish Academy of Pharmaceutical Sciences (2003); Tetrahedron Young Investigator Award in Bioorganic and Medicinal Chemistry (2006); Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2006).

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