Patrick Harran
Patrick Harran (b 13 July 1969) was raised in Corinth, New York. He attended Corinth Central High School until entering Skidmore College[1] as an early admissions student. In his freshman year, the college hired organic chemist Raymond Giguere[2]. Giguere had an infectious enthusiasm for chemistry and Harran became one of his first research students. Harran spent the next years studying tandem ene / intramolecular Diels-Alder processes. In 1990, he moved to New Haven for graduate studies at Yale University[3] with Frederick Ziegler[4]. He obtained a doctorate for studies on photochemically generated, carbon-centered radicals and their cyclization reactions. After an NIH-sponsored postdoctoral fellowship with Paul Wender[5] at Stanford University[6], Harran joined the faculty at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center (UTSW) in Fall 1997.[7]
UTSW was among the premier biomedical research centers in the world. It was home to four active Nobel Prize winners and growing rapidly under the leadership of Kern Wildenthal[8]. Geneticist Steve McKnight had left Tularik to become chair of the biochemistry department the year prior, and he recruited Harran to bring synthetic chemistry into their cellular and molecular biology graduate programs. Harran established a lab alongside the groups of Xiaodong Wang and Masashi Yanagisawa and began working with Dean John Perkins to implement a Chemistry Tract within their existing Biological Chemistry program. The next years saw a flurry of activity. McKnight and Harran recruited five junior chemistry faculty: 1998 – Jef De Brabander (Stanford, University of Geneva), 2002 – Joseph Ready (Harvard); 2003 – Chuo Chen (Harvard); 2006 – Doug Frantz (Merck, ETH/Zurich); and 2007 – John MacMillan (Scripps). With new colleagues came new course offerings and the Chemistry Tract matured as an independent division. The graduate student population grew and the program flourished.
Harran was promoted to tenured Associate Professor in 2002 and to Full Professor in 2005. The same year he was named the Mar Nell & F. Andrew Bell Distinguished Chair in Biochemistry. In 2005 he co-founded Joyant Pharmaceuticals with the backing of Sanderling Ventures[9]. Assets developed at Joyant provided a basis for launching Diazon Pharmaceuticals in 2013. He joined the faculty at the University of California Los Angeles in 2008 as the inaugural Donald J. & Jane M. Cram Chair in Organic Chemistry.
==Research== [10] Harran's research is focused on the total synthesis of natural products, design of novel chemical compounds to study protein–protein interactions, and medicinal chemistry.[11]
Awards and Honors[12]
- Inaugural Robert Foster Cherry Lecture on Research and Education 2019[13]
- JSPS Fellow and International Organic Chemistry Foundation Yoshida Lectureship 2017[14]
- Herbert Newby McCoy Award 2016[15]
- Hanson-Dow Award for Excellence in Teaching, 2013
- Glenn T. Seaborg Award - Alpha Chi Sigma, 2009
- Norman Hackerman Prize of the Robert A. Welch Foundation, 2007
- E. Bright Wilson Prize - Harvard University, 2005
- Merck Research Laboratories Chemistry Council Award, 2005-2007
- Mar Nell and F. Andrew Bell Distinguished Chair, 2005
- Pfizer Award for Creativity in Organic Synthesis, 2003
- Distinguished Alumni Award, Skidmore College, 2003
- Eli Lilly Grantee, 2003-2004
- AstraZeneca Excellence in Chemistry Award, 2002
- Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, 2002-2004
- National Science Foundation CAREER Award, 2000-2004
- National Research Service Award, Stanford University, 1995-1997
- Bristol-Myers Squibb Research Fellow, Yale University, 1993
- American Institute of Chemists Award, Skidmore College, 1990
- Highest Departmental Honors in Chemistry, Skidmore College, 1990
- One Year Advanced Admission, Skidmore College, 1986
Laboratory fire
On December 29, 2008, a tert-butyl lithium fire in Harran's laboratory severely injured research assistant Sheharbano Sangji, and she died from complications in January 2009. In late 2011, days before the statute of limitations was to expire, the University of California and Harran were accused of felony violations of the California workplace safety code. Harran became the first American academic criminally charged for a laboratory accident. Harran’s attorneys ultimately petitioned the California Court of Appeal to challenge the premise of the case[16]. A deferred prosecution agreement was offered in 2014 and Harran agreed to donate to the Grossman Burn Center, lecture on safety principles and teach a summer course for the Noonan South Central Scholars Program. In September 2018 the Los Angeles District Attorney dismissed all charges against Harran.[17]
References
- ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skidmore_College
- ^ https://www.skidmore.edu/chemistry/faculty/giguere.php
- ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yale_University
- ^ https://chem.yale.edu/people/frederick-ziegler
- ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Wender
- ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_University
- ^ https://www.utsouthwestern.edu/newsroom/articles/year-2019/hackerman-award.html
- ^ https://science.sciencemag.org/content/274/5292/1459
- ^ http://www.sanderling.com
- ^ http://www.chem.ucla.edu/harran/
- ^ "Harran Research Group - Research Interests". University of California at Los Angeles. Archived from the original on 2015-04-18.
- ^ "Harran Research Group". www.chem.ucla.edu. Retrieved 2016-08-02.
- ^ https://www.baylor.edu/mediacommunications/news.php?action=story&story=209005
- ^ https://www.chemistry.ucla.edu/news/31st-iocf-yoshida-lectureship
- ^ https://www.chemistry.ucla.edu/news/2016-departmental-awards-ceremony
- ^ https://www.paulhastings.com/news/details/?id=2c6ee169-2334-6428-811c-ff00004cbded
- ^ https://www.latimes.com/la-me-ln-harran-case-dismissed-20180912-story.html
| Authority control databases: National |
|---|
