University at Buffalo - The State University of New York

Published: October 28, 2004

By ELLEN GOLDBAUM
Contributing Editor

Huw M. L. Davies, Larkin Professor of Organic Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry, College of Arts and Sciences, has been awarded a prestigious Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award from the American Chemical Society.

DAVIES

The Cope Scholar Award recognizes and encourages excellence in organic chemistry.

Davies will receive the award at the Arthur C. Cope Symposium during the Fall 2005 meeting of the American Chemical Society, where he will give a presentation about his research.

The award consists of $5,000, a certificate and a $40,000 unrestricted research grant to the winner's institution.

Davies holds more than 10 drug-related patents, has published more than 150 papers and conducts research funded by the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation and Johnson & Johnson.

Throughout his career, Davies has developed novel organic synthesis methods that either facilitate or dramatically enhance critical chemical reactions, providing for faster and more efficient synthesis of important pharmaceutical compounds.

Davies developed a method for synthesizing new, complex chemicals from cheap, bulk chemicals that allows for the activation of the normally unreactive carbon-hydrogen bonds in organic molecules.

In the publication describing that work, Davies and his co-authors highlighted this method's effectiveness in synthesizing two very important pharmaceuticals: Ritalin, the treatment for children with attention-deficit disorders, and sertraline, the commonly prescribed antidepressant marketed as Zoloft.

Davies and his colleagues also have made important advances that facilitate the use of combinatorial chemistry and its commercial potential for drug discovery and development. This includes new approaches to diversity synthesis techniques that generate a far more diverse array of chemical compounds with potential biological activity than the traditional combinatorial chemistry techniques.

Other research interests of Davies include new strategies for synthesizing new therapeutic agents against tuberculosis and cancer and the development of compounds that could be used to treat cocaine addiction.

Before joining the UB faculty in 1995, Davies, a native of Aberystwyth, Wales, taught at Wake Forest University and the Bowman Gray School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, N.C.

He is a recipient of the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Scholarship and Creative Activities, the Chancellor's Research Recognition Award and the Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching. He also was awarded an Arts and Sciences Faculty Teaching Award the first year it was instituted.

Davies received a bachelor's degree from University College Cardiff, Wales and a doctorate from the University of East Anglia in England. He conducted post-doctoral research at Princeton University.