Jason McIntee

Background

About Jason McIntee

Even as a scientist, I believe that creativity is my defining characteristic. That is the driving force of science - new knowledge can be obtained only by imagining what knowledge might be acquired. As an organic chemist, I know how to plan a journey from starting material to target, and how to perform each step of the journey. True science and true progress happens only when the destination is new, interesting and challenging. Whenever I work on a project, thoughts of how the steps might be improved, or how the project might be expanded in a new direction, flow constantly. I can perform bench work as well as any good chemist, but I believe that what sets me apart from others is is the desire for novelty, the need to try new things in new ways, and the frequent sparks of insight into where a project might be taken. My objective, in the longer term, is to work on projects that are multiplicative rather than additive in their contributions. That is, I wish to do work that helps other scientists' progress, not only to progress on a single line of inquiry. The greatest achievement for me would be to produce research like that of W. Clark Still, who gave chemists the invaluable tool of flash chromatography (J. Org. Chem, 1978, 43, 2923, a paper that has been cited over 3800 times). Specialties: Organic synthesis, purification and characterization of organic compounds, chemical education, scientific writing.