Research

Justina Burns, Ph.D. serves as Associate Director of Analytical Chemistry supporting process development at the Medicines for All Institute. Previously she worked in contract research supporting a variety of projects which included sample preparation/analysis, report writing and training. Additionally, Justina worked in the Mass Spectrometry Center at the University of South Carolina focusing on ICP-MS. She holds a B.S. in chemistry from University of Pittsburgh, Johnstown and a Ph.D. in analytical environmental chemistry from the University of South Carolina.

Daniel W. Cook, PhD is a senior analytical chemist within the Medicines for All Institute where he utilizes his expertise in separation sciences and chemometrics to develop and implement analytical methods to support the Institute’s various projects. He holds a B.S in chemistry from Randolph-Macon College in Ashland, VA and a Ph.D. in chemistry from VCU. Prior to his current role at M4ALL, he held a postdoctoral fellowship at VCU in the Chemical and Life Science Engineering department working on both the Pharmacy on Demand project under Dr. Thomas Roper and M4ALL under Dr. Frank Gupton. He transitioned into his current role in early 2019.

Dr. Titas Deb joins our team from the University of Utah where she successfully defended her PhD thesis while serving as a graduate student in the synthetic medicinal chemistry department. While at the University of Utah, she had the opportunity to work on investigating a divergent reactivity between Cu(I) and Rh(II) carbenes generated from vinyl diazophosphonates as well as projects involving bioorthogonal chemistry and self-immolative linkers to improve the biodistribution of PSMA-targeting radiopharmaceuticals. Titas brings experience with the synthesis and purification of small molecules and technical skills in NMR, HPLC and LC-MS.

Daryl Guthrie (PhD Chemistry Johns Hopkins University, BSc Chemistry Randolph-Macon College) is a Richmond native who joined M4ALL’s Global Health research team in August, 2022.  He is a former NIH postdoctoral fellow at the National Institute on Drug Abuse Intramural Research Program (NIDA-IRP), where he designed and synthesized novel dopamine transporter (DAT) ligands, including 1) fluorescent cocaine analogs enabling single-molecule localization microscopy, and 2) tropane-based ibogaine analogs for rescuing the function of misfolded DAT mutants associated with Dopamine Transporter Deficiency Syndrome (DTDS).  Daryl's PhD at Johns Hopkins, focused on developing efficient HNO prodrug therapeutics for treating acute and chronic heart failure, for which he holds multiple patents. At M4ALL, Daryl applies novel chemistry to design and develop scalable, low-cost synthetic routes and processes to known or in-development active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and their key starting materials.

Sam brings nearly 17 years of diverse experience, first spending time in the automotive industry early on in his career before moving into organic and analytical chemistry groups. He worked several years in the aerospace industry on complex high precision microwave, millimeter wave and sub-millimeter wave passive components and assemblies for ground and space use. Most recently for the past 6 years, he has been in supervisory roles helping grow the next generation of chemists by training on how to operate and maintain analytical instrumentation.  He earned his BS in Chemistry from Purdue University at Fort Wayne.

Dr. Li Jin earned his Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry (SIOC), an institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and he completed postdoctoral trainings at both Clemson University and University of South Florida in the US. Dr. Jin is an experienced scientist with over 20 years of organic synthesis experience in both industry and academia.  He has expertise in asymmetric catalysis, API synthesis, process development, and scale-up in both R&D and GMP environments.  Prior to joining M4ALL, he led a team of scientists in the Synthetic Chemistry Department at Olon Ricerca Bioscience.  Beyond his expertise as a scientist, Li also brings experience leading teams, managing complex projects with tight deadlines, providing technical support to and communicating with sponsors/customers, and has authored 28 publications in high-impact journals including JACS and ACIE.

Dr. Pankaj Khairnar is a research scientist at Medicines for All Institute (M4ALL) working on the low-cost synthesis and process development to access active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs). He received his Ph.D in 2020 from National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan, under the supervision of Prof. Wenwei Lin, where he worked on asymmetric organocatalysis and intramolecular Wittig reactions strategy using nucleophilic phosphine. Before his Ph.D he worked as an project assistant (2014-2016) at CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory, Pune, India, under the supervision of Dr. D. Srinivasa Reddy, where he worked on total synthesis of natural products and was involved in several medicinal chemistry programs.

Roudabeh Moazeni obtained her Ph.D. in Chemometrics, Analytical Chemistry at Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran, in 2014.  Her research focuses on the application of mathematical and statistical methods to evaluate data and analytical measurements. Dr. Moazeni combines chemometrics and analytical chemistry for use in areas such as biology, pharmaceuticals, chemistry, chemical engineering, food and environmental sciences. Her slogan is to “Help and make the people of the world be healthier and happier”. She joined Medicines for All Institute at VCU to develop process analytical technologies and chemometric models which can monitor the quality of pharmaceutical processes.

Rajkumar Sahani, Ph.D. received his Master's from the University of Mumbai in 2010 and worked with Nycomed Pharmaceuticals to design and synthesize tryptophan hydroxylase 1 (TPH-1) inhibitors. In 2013, he moved to Taiwan to pursue his doctorate studies under the guidance of Dr. Rai-Shung Liu at National Tsing-Hua University (NTHU), where he continued to work as a postdoctoral researcher until mid 2019. Dr. Sahani's area of research during his Ph.D. was the use of gold-catalyst to transform readily available starting materials into biologically relevant heterocycles. Most recently, he has been working at the Center for Drug Design, University of Minnesota, where he synthesized antivirals targeting HIV-1 capsid protein. 

Anand H. Shinde, Ph.D., completed his M.Sc. in Organic Chemistry at Fergusson college, Pune in India. He then completed a Ph.D. in Chemistry at Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad (IITH), India under the guidance of Professor D. S. Sharada in 2017 where he worked on cycloadditions and NH-activations strategies for the synthesis of novel drug-like molecules. Subsequently, he joined Professor Barry M. Trost’s research group in 2018 as Postdoctoral Research Scholar at Stanford University, where he worked on asymmetric catalysis in cycloaddition reactions. From there, he moved to University of Kansas to Prof. Shyam Sathyamoorthi’s research group as Postdoctoral Research Scholar, where he worked on metal catalyzed organic transformations (2019-2022). He is currently with Medicines for All working on process development to access active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs).

Barrack Stubbs, Ph.D. is a senior analytical chemist for Medicines for All. He earned his undergraduate degree in chemistry from Kettering University in Flint, Michigan and his M.Sc and PhD in analytical chemistry from Michigan State University. Following graduation he served as an instructor of general chemistry courses at MSU. He brings over 14 years of combined education and hands-on experience in teaching and research. Prior to joining M4ALL Barrack worked as an analytical chemist for PharmaChem Technologies in Freeport, Bahamas.

Nakul holds BPharm and MPharm degrees from the University of Mumbai, and Ph.D. in Medicinal Chemistry from University of Mississippi (Olemiss). Dr. Nakul Telang has broad experience in synthetic organic chemistry. He brings to the organization about 7 years of his strong post-doctoral research experience with focus on multidisciplinary approach. Before joining Medicines for All Initiative, his research focus was on the design, synthesis and lead optimization of novel chemical entities (NCEs) to develop potent and selective compounds for the treatment of breast cancer under the valuable guidance of Professor John Gupton at University of Richmond. As a post-doctoral fellow in Gupton's group, he also successfully synthesized numerous pyrrole-based marine natural products (Ningalins, Polycitrins, Lycogalic
acid and Lycogarubicin C). In addition, he had the opportunity to collaborate on an externally funded project with Boehringer Ingelheim, on the process optimization of initial key steps in the synthesis of Pradaxa. Previously, he also served as a visiting lecturer of Organic Chemistry at University of Richmond and was invited to teach a science outreach course titled as 'Great Ideas in Science' at School of Professional and Continuing Studies (SPCS) at University of Richmond.