Francisco Dean Toste (born 1971) is the Gerald E. K. Branch Distinguished Professor of

Chemistry Chemistry is the scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a physical science within the natural sciences that studies the chemical elements that make up matter and chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules a ...

at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

and faculty scientist at the chemical sciences division of

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL, Berkeley Lab) is a Federally funded research and development centers, federally funded research and development center in the Berkeley Hills, hills of Berkeley, California, United States. Established i ...

. He is a prominent figure in the field of

organic chemistry Organic chemistry is a subdiscipline within chemistry involving the science, scientific study of the structure, properties, and reactions of organic compounds and organic matter, organic materials, i.e., matter in its various forms that contain ...

and is best known for his contributions to

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

chemistry and

asymmetric ion-pairing catalysis Asymmetric ion-pairing catalysis in chemistry is a type of asymmetric catalysis taking place specifically with charged intermediates or charged reagents. In one type of catalysis ion-pairing exists with a charged and chiral catalyst. The charged ...

. Toste was elected a member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...

in 2020, and a member of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (The Academy) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and other ...

in 2018.

Education and training

F. Dean Toste was born in

Terceira Terceira () is a volcanic island in the Azores archipelago, about a third of the way across the North Atlantic Ocean at a similar latitude to Portugal's capital Lisbon, with the island group forming an insular part of Portugal. It is one of the ...

, Azores, Portugal in 1971. He attended the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university whose main campus is located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was founded by ...

for his undergraduate and masters studies in the group of Ian Still. With Still, Toste developed several novel reactions of thiocyanates that were then applied towards the synthesis of the natural product Varacin. He earned his B.Sc. in 1993 and his M.Sc. in 1995. Toste attended graduate school at

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

, earning his PhD under the supervision of

Barry Trost Barry M. Trost (born June 13, 1941, in Philadelphia) is an American chemist who is the Job and Gertrud Tamaki Professor Emeritus in the School of Humanities and Sciences at Stanford University. The Tsuji–Trost reaction and the Trost ligand ar ...

in 2000 While at Stanford, Toste published twenty-four publications on a range of topics, including phenols in palladium-catalyzed reactions, and ruthenium-catalyzed carbon-carbon bond forming reactions. He also completed the

enantioselective In chemistry, stereoselectivity is the property of a chemical reaction in which a single reactant forms an unequal mixture of stereoisomers during a non- stereospecific creation of a new stereocenter or during a non-stereospecific transformation o ...

total syntheses of the

natural product A natural product is a natural compound or substance produced by a living organism—that is, found in nature. In the broadest sense, natural products include any substance produced by life. Natural products can also be prepared by chemical s ...

s (−)-galanthamine, (−)-aflatoxin B₁ and (−)-calanolide A and B. From 2001 to 2002, Toste conducted postdoctoral studies at the

California Institute of Technology The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech) is a private research university in Pasadena, California, United States. The university is responsible for many modern scientific advancements and is among a small group of institutes ...

with

Robert H. Grubbs Robert Howard Grubbs ForMemRS (February 27, 1942 – December 19, 2021) was an American chemist and the Victor and Elizabeth Atkins Professor of Chemistry at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California. He was a co-recipient o ...

, where he worked on ruthenium-catalyzed cross-metathesis variants of the

olefin metathesis In organic chemistry, Olefin Metathesis or Alkene Metathesis is an organic reaction that entails the redistribution of fragments of alkenes (olefins) by the Bond cleavage, scission and regeneration of carbon-carbon double bonds. Because of the ...

reaction.

Independent career

Toste joined the faculty at

Berkeley Berkeley most often refers to: *Berkeley, California, a city in the United States **University of California, Berkeley, a public university in Berkeley, California *George Berkeley (1685–1753), Anglo-Irish philosopher Berkeley may also refer to ...

in 2002 as an assistant professor. He was promoted to associate professor in 2006, and professor in 2009. In 2017, Toste was appointed the Gerald E. K. Branch Distinguished Professor. He has served as a faculty scientist at the chemical sciences division of

since 2007.

Awards and honors

Toste is the recipient of numerous awards for his work, including the Janssen Prize for Creativity in Organic Synthesis in 2018, the

Humboldt Research Award The Humboldt Research Award (), also known informally as the Humboldt Prize, is an award given by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation of Germany to internationally renowned scientists and scholars who work outside of Germany in recognition of t ...

in 2016, the Catalysis in Organic Chemistry Award from the

Royal Society of Chemistry The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) is a learned society and professional association in the United Kingdom with the goal of "advancing the chemistry, chemical sciences". It was formed in 1980 from the amalgamation of the Chemical Society, the ...

in 2018, and the

American Chemical Society The American Chemical Society (ACS) is a scientific society based in the United States that supports scientific inquiry in the field of chemistry. Founded in 1876 at New York University, the ACS currently has more than 155,000 members at all ...

Cope Scholar and E. J. Corey Awards.

References

External links

Toste Group at Berkeley
{{DEFAULTSORT:Toste, F Dean 1971 births Living people Canadian chemists Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences American chemists UC Berkeley College of Chemistry faculty