Kristen Nailor

B.S. Biochemistry, 2001, Indiana University, IN

Kristen Nailor is of Hoosier origin, and she completed her B.S. degree in Biochemistry in 2001. As an undergraduate in the group, Kristy was part of the early effort to realize free radical-mediated aryl amination. Throughout her years at IU, she worked under the umbrella of the IU STARS program, providing an early entry into the research enivironment at IU. During her undergraduate years, she was also a summer intern at Eli Lilly in Discovery Chemistry, working with Dr. Kumiko Takeuchi and Dr. Sandra Filla. In 2001, she joined GlaxoSmithKline in Research Triangle, NC, as an associate scientist. She is currently the Chemical Management Specialist for the Vanderbilt Program in Drug Discovery in the Department of Pharmacology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, TN.
Org. Lett. 2002, 4, 4197.

Heather Burks

Postdoctoral Scholar, 2009, UC Berkeley, CA
Ph.D. Chemistry, 2008, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC
B.S. Chemistry, 2003, Indiana University, IN

Heather Burks was born and raised in Indiana, and joined the Johnston group as an undergraduate in her third year. Heather initiated the scale-up of the indoline a-amino acid synthesis based on free radical-mediated aryl amination, and began our program aimed at the investigation of their use in short peptides. In recognition of her abilities, Heather was named a Beckman Scholar, and supported for two academic years and one summer by this program. In 2003, Heather was awarded a B.S. Chemistry degree, and in 2008 received her Ph.D. in Chemistry at the University of North Carolina with Jim Morken (now at Boston College). Heather was a postdoctoral scholar with Dean Toste at UC Berkeley before beginning her current position in Global Discovery Chemistry at Novartis (Cambridge, MA).
Synthesis 2005, 2, 330.

Travis Smith

B.S. Chemistry, 2004, Indiana University, IN

Travis was born and raised in Crown Point, IN. He joined the Johnston research program in 2003, and contributed to the effort in chiral proton catalysis. His accomplishment was recognized by an Eli Lilly Undergraduate Summer Research Fellowship in 2004. He completed his degree requirements later that year, and Travis began studies in the IU School of Law in August 2005.

Abram Hess

B.S. Chemistry, 2007, Indiana University, IN

Abram is a Bloomington native who began at IU in 2003 as a chemistry major. Abram is an IU Stars awardee who, through this program, was able to join the Johnston group as a freshman. Abram has played a supporting role in the proton catalysis area, and was the first in the group to measure the pKa for BAM-HX Bronsted acids.
SynLett 2006, 1, 147.

Brandon Steele

B.S. Chemistry, 2004, Indiana University, IN

Brandon Steele is an Indiana native, and joined the group in his last year as an undergraduate at IU. Brandon contributed to the scale up effort for the asymmetric synthesis of the IAN amines. He graduated from IU in 2004, and began graduate studies in chemistry at the University of Idaho later that year.

Ryan Kilgore

B.S. Chemistry, 2005, Indiana University, IN

Ryan joined the Johnston group briefly as a part of a trek from a music career to Russian studies. He began at IU in the School of Music as a tuba major, but became enamored with organic chemistry after taking the lecture course as an elective. Unfortunately, the lure of Russian studies was overwhelming, and he made a final (?) diversion in that direction after an academic year spent with the group.

Carla Counceller

B.S. Chemistry, 2005, Indiana University, IN

Carla Counceller (nee Beatty) is a native of Indiana, entering IU as an undergraduate in 2001. Carla joined the group in her junior year and contributed to the scale up of the asymmetric synthesis of the IAN amines. In 2004, Carla was awarded a nationally-competitive Pfizer Summer Undergraduate Research Scholarship. Carla graduated with a B.S. Chemistry degree in 2005, and began graduate studies in organic chemistry at the Ohio State University. She completed her Ph.D. in Chemistry with James Stambuli in 2010, and accepted a position at Chemical Abstracts.
Org. Lett. 2008, 10, 2445.

Bobby Bowman

B.S. Chemistry, 2010, Vanderbilt University, TN

Robert 'Bobby' Bowman was born and raised in Las Vegas, Nevada. He migrated eastward to Nashville in 2006 and began his undergraduate studies at Vanderbilt as a chemistry major. Bobby has been named to the Dean's List each semester and began undergraduate chemistry research in 2007, contributing to our program in catalysis. Bobby was attracted to the group by its legendary football games. Following graduation, Bobby began postgraduate studies at Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York City, where he worked with Johanna Joyce studying the role of tumor associated macrophages in glioma. He is currently a postdoctoral fellow at MSK.

Aspen Chun

B.A. Chemistry, 2011, Vanderbilt, TN

Aspen is a native of California (Los Angeles) but spent the better part of her formative years in South Korea. She returned to the US in 2004, ultimately matriculating at Vanderbilt in 2008. She began research in the group in 2009, and helped with our large scale preparation of PBAM.
Org. Synth. 2012, 89, 380.

Vanessa Arredondo

B.A. Chemistry, 2012, Vanderbilt University, TN

Vanessa, born and raised in beautiful, sunny California, joined the Johnston Group in Spring 2011 as an undergraduate following an NSF-REU  summer experience with Stefan France at Georgia Tech. At Vanderbilt, she has prepared (-)-Nutlin-3, a potent p53/MDM2 inhibitor currently in development as a cancer chemotherapeutic by Hoffmann-La Roche and others, and prepared a novel analog with the cis-imidazoline backbone as one of our collaborative efforts in drug development. Vanessa is currently a graduate student in chemistry and NSF Predoctoral Fellow at the University of California, Irvine.
J. Org. Chem. 2014, 79, 6913.

Emily Wang

B.S. Chemistry (anticipated), 2015, Vanderbilt University, TN

Emily was born and raised in East Brunswick, New Jersey. She plans to enter medical school following graduation from Vanderbilt.

Zachary Carter

Zach completed his undergraduate work at Vanderbilt University, majoring in Chemical Engineering and Chemistry, with minors in biology and neuroscience. He was born and raised in Chicago, IL. Zach is a Chancellor’s Scholar and continuing Resident Advisor in the Martha Ingram Freshmen Commons. He was also the Cultural Chair of the Vanderbilt Association of Hispanic Students. Zach took organic chemistry as a Freshman and gained research experience through the Department of Epithelial Cancer Biology. In 2014 he began work with the Johnston laboratory in an effort to apply new chemical methods to the synthesis of natural products with interesting biological activity, and became a VU Beckman Scholar for May 2014-August 2015. Zach graduated in May 2016, and he begins graduate studies in computational chemistry at Yale in the Fall.

Sarah Sun

B.A. Chemistry/Applied Math, 2017, Vanderbilt University, TN

Sarah began working with the group as a junior at Vanderbilt University majoring in chemistry and applied mathematics. She has lived most of her life in Houston, TX, but was born in Norway, and has family living in China, Norway, Canada, and the United States. Sarah is a College Scholar in the College of Arts and Science. She was also public relations chair of the Vanderbilt American Chemical Society and on the executive board of the Scientific Immersion and Mentorship program. Beginning her sophomore year, she conducted research investigating the linkages between irregular patterns of RNA editing and the development of depression. In the spring of 2016 she joined the Johnston lab where her research was focused on synthesis of the chiral organocatalyst, PBAM, and its application in halolactonization reactions. Following graduation in 2017, she entered the MSTP program at the University of Chicago School of Medicine. As of 2025, Sarah was a resident/fellow at Stanford University in rheumatology.
J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2018, 140, 1998.

Karan Goyal

B.S. Chemistry (anticipated), 2019, Vanderbilt University, TN

Karan is from Knoxville, TN and attends Vanderbilt University majoring in Chemistry with a Chinese minor. He came in as a chemical engineering major but switched after realizing it was more engineering than chemical (cE, not Ce). In his free time, he enjoys cooking, watching copious amounts of cartoons, and occasionally running. After graduating with honors in 2019, he began chemistry graduate studies at U. California, Berkeley. Following his Ph.D. degree with Richmond Sarpong in 2024, Karan began his position in medicinal chemistry at Arcus Biosciences.

Peter Shen

B.A. Biochemistry, 2022, Vanderbilt University, TN

Peter was raised in Eugene, Oregon. He is currently majoring in Biochemistry with a minor in Economics. He hopes to be an orthopedic surgeon and dreams of working at an Olympic Games in the future. Outside the lab, Peter enjoys playing tennis, running, playing piano, and spending time with friends and family.

Hannah Craft

B.A. Biochemistry & Chemical Biology (Honors), 2022, Vanderbilt University, TN

Hannah Craft is an undergrad at VU (’22) majoring in Biochemistry. She attended the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science, where her interests in science and research blossomed. After being accepted into Vanderbilt’s MARC (Maximizing Access to to Research Careers) Program in the summer of 2020, she became an undergraduate researcher with the group. Hannah worked toward several analogues of ent-verticilide within our program to develop innovative antiarrhythmia therapeutics. Outside of science, she also served on the board of two student organizations at Vanderbilt, the NAACP Student Chapter and Global Medical Missions Alliance (GMMA). Hannah completed her degree with Honors in 2022 to begin medical school. Her long-term goals include an MD (and maybe her PhD), aspiring to work as a medical doctor and researcher to serve others through science.

Julius Jan

B.A. Chemistry & Cognitive Studies, 2024, Vanderbilt University, TN

Julius was born and raised in Singapore and attends Vanderbilt University majoring in cognitive studies and chemistry. He began working with the group as a sophomore in late 2021 and received an award from the Goldberg Family Immersion Fund to continue his work in the lab for the summer of 2022.