Scott Taylor
Biography
Scott Taylor's research is highly interdisciplinary ranging from synthetic organic chemistry to medicinal chemistry and enzymology, to the development of new bionanomaterials. He develops new synthetic methodology and applies it to the synthesis of novel biomolecules and materials such as modified steroids, carbohydrates, amino acids, peptides, nucleosides, nucleotides and starch nanoparticles.
His research program is currently focussed on four key areas: (1) the synthesis and study of cyclic lipodepsipeptide antibiotics; (2) the development of novel phosphorylation chemistry and its application to the synthesis of inhibitors of cytidine triphosphate synthase, an anti-cancer and antiviral target; (3) the development of inhibitors of steroid sulfatase, a breast cancer target and, (4) the modification of starch nanoparticles which are evaluated for their ability to extract oil from oil sands and as novel wound dressings.
A wide variety of techniques are employed such as nuclear magnetic resonance, fluorimetry, high-performance liquid chromatography, protein purification, spectrophotometry, mass spectrometry, differential scanning calorimetry and dynamic light scattering.
His research program is currently focussed on four key areas: (1) the synthesis and study of cyclic lipodepsipeptide antibiotics; (2) the development of novel phosphorylation chemistry and its application to the synthesis of inhibitors of cytidine triphosphate synthase, an anti-cancer and antiviral target; (3) the development of inhibitors of steroid sulfatase, a breast cancer target and, (4) the modification of starch nanoparticles which are evaluated for their ability to extract oil from oil sands and as novel wound dressings.
A wide variety of techniques are employed such as nuclear magnetic resonance, fluorimetry, high-performance liquid chromatography, protein purification, spectrophotometry, mass spectrometry, differential scanning calorimetry and dynamic light scattering.
Research Interests
- Biological and medicinal chemistry
- Synthetic methodology
- Enzymology
- Bionanomaterials
- Drug Discovery, Design and Delivery
- Biomaterials, Polymers and Bioplastics
- Nanomaterials
Education
- 1991 Ph.D., Chemistry, University of Toronto, Canada
- 1986 B.Sc., Biochemistry, McGill University, Canada
Awards
- 2023 Bernard Belleau Award, Chemical Institute of Canada
- 2012 and 2017 Outstanding Performance Award
- 2000 Premiere’s Research Excellence Award
- 1997 International Union of Pure and Applied Chemists (IUPAC) Travel Award
- 1992-94 Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) Post-Doctoral Fellowship, Dept. of Chemistry, The Pennsylvania State University
- 1990-91 Ontario Graduate Scholarship, Dept. of Chemistry, University of Toronto
- 1988-90 Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) Post-1988-90 Graduate Scholarship B, Dept. of Chemistry, University of Toronto
- 1990 Bio-Mega Boehringer Ingelheim Inc. Award for excellence in graduate research, Dept. of Chemistry, University of Toronto
- 1987-88 Ontario Graduate Scholarship, Dept. of Chemistry, University of Toronto
- 1988 George F. Wright Seminar Award for outstanding graduate student presentation, Dept. of Chemistry, University of Toronto
- 1984-85 Faculty Scholar, McGill University
Service
- 2014-present, Chair, Mass Spec Users Committee
- 2013-present, Awards Committee,
- 2000-present, NMR Users Committee
Affiliations and Volunteer Work
- Member, Institute of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
- Member, Waterloo Institute for Nanotechnology
Teaching*
- CHEM 262 - Organic Chemistry for Engineering
- Taught in 2021
- CHEM 381 - Bioorganic Chemistry
- Taught in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2024
- CHEM 383 - Medicinal Chemistry
- Taught in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2023
- CHEM 760 - Selected Topics in Organic Chemistry
- Taught in 2020
* Only courses taught in the past 5 years are displayed.
Selected/Recent Publications
- Kralt, B.; Moreira, R.; Palmer, M.; Taylor, S. D.* Total Synthesis of Analogs of A54145D and A54145A1 for Structure-Activity Relationship Studies. 2020, in press.
- Soley, J.; Taylor, S. D.* A Mild, Rapid, Chemo- and Regioselective Procedure for the Introduction of the 9-Phenyl-9-fluorenyl Protecting Group into Amines, Acids, Alcohols, Sulfonamides and Amides. J. Org. Chem. 2020, in press.
- Mohamady, S.; Ismaila, M. I.; Mogheith, S. M.; Attiac, Y. M.; Taylor, S. D. Discovery of 5-Aryl-3-Thiophen-2-yl-1H-Pyrazoles as a New Class of HSP90 Inhibitors in Hepatocellular Carcinoma. Bioorg.Chem., 2020, 103433.
- Moreira, R.; Diamandas, M.; Taylor, S. D.* Synthesis of Fmoc-protected amino alcohols via the Sharpless asymmetric aminohydroxylation reaction using FmocNHCl as the nitrogen source. J. Org. Chem. 2019, 84, 15476-15485.
- Kralt, B.; Moreira, R.; Palmer, M.; Taylor, S. D.* Total synthesis of A5145 factor D. J. Org. Chem. 2019, 84, 12021-12030.
- Noden, M.; Moreira, R.; Huang, E.; Yousef, A.; Palmer, M.; Taylor, S. D.* Total Synthesis of Paenibacterin and its Analogs. J. Org. Chem., 2019, 8, 5339-5347.
- Zheng, B.; Karski, M.; Taylor, S. D.* Thermoresponsive hydroxybutylated starch nanoparticles. Carbohydr. Polymers, 2019, 206, 145-151.
- Moreira, R.; Barnawi, G.; Beriashvili, D.; Palmer, M.; Taylor, S. D.* The effect of replacing the ester bond with an amide bond and of overall stereochemistry on the activity of daptomycin. Bioorg. Med. Chem. 2019, 27, 240-246.