Ariel Richards ’23 Receives Fellowship from American Society of Pharmacognosy

Ariel Richards ’23 has been selected for a competitive American Society of Pharmacognosy (ASP) Summer Research Fellowship (SRF). No more than six students are selected nationwide to receive this award each year. Richards' fellowship will take place this summer in the laboratory of Erick Leggans, assistant professor of chemistry at Grinnell College and member of the ASP. ASP members investigate plants and other natural products for drug discovery. 

Their research project is “Repurposing of Terpene Natural Products” and a continuation of research that Richards and others in the lab have begun in the spring of 2021. According to Leggans, terpenes are commonly used in medicines and are a diverse class of natural product “due to their unique structural skeletons and extensive oxidation.” One of the goals of the project is to “synthesize structural analogues of commercially available terpene natural products” in order to improve the ways terpenes can be made for medicinal use. Initially, they will focus on terpenes derived from plants like stevia, licorice root, and mango. During this research, Richards and others working in Leggans’ lab will be synthesizing molecules and evaluating their biological activity. This interdisciplinary project has the potential to lead to a published paper in the future.

The ASP SRF cohort, made up of the six fellowship recipients for this summer, participates in weekly virtual workshops for training and development and receives guidance on entering graduate school. In addition, Richards will be part of the Grinnell College summer research program, which includes regular individual meetings with Leggans, daily interaction with other Grinnell students in the Leggans lab, and a poster session at the end of the summer with all the chemistry summer research students. Summer research at Grinnell is a full-time commitment for 10 weeks and an intense experience to help prepare them for their future as chemists.