Chi Hsien-Wang and Molly Warndorf stand in front of a poster, reading its content.

Chi Hsien-Wang and Molly Warndorf at Poster Session.

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

Jordan Bench stands in front of a poster presenting their work to Sunny Tang.

Jordan Bench (Pentelute Lab) gives poster presentation to Sunny Tang (Wendlandt Lab).

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

A group of attendees stand in the cavernous Morss Hall.

Organic Retreat Poster Session at Morss Hall

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

Yichen Nie presents her work to Scott Denmark and other onlookers.

Yichen Nie (Wendlandt Lab) gives poster presentation to Prof. Scott Denmark and graduate students.

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

Dennis Kutateladze (second from the right, Buchwald and Pentelute Lab) gives poster presentation.

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

Erika Zhang stands in front of a poster.

Erika Zhang (Raines Lab) gives poster presentation.

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

Gerard Porter stands in front of a poster and indicates toward it as others look on.

Gerard Porter (Kiessling Lab) gives poster presentation

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

A group of attendees stand in the cavernous Morss Hall.

Organic Retreat Poster Session at Morss Hall

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

Ashton Davis stands in front of a poster and indicates toward it as Thomas and Mayar look on.

Ashton Davis (Swager Lab) gives a poster presentation to Thomas Pioch and Mayar Alhelaili (Swager Lab)

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

Hallie Trial stands in front of a poster and indicates toward it as Gerard Porter looks on.

Hallie Trial (Kiessling Lab) gives a poster presentation to Gerard Porter(Kiessling Lab)

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

Eduard Bobylev stands in front of a wall and a projection screen.

Dr. Eduard Bobylev (Johnson Lab) gives talk “Metal Organic Cage Polymer Hybrids”

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

Benjamin Senzer stands in front of a wall and a projection screen.

Benjamin Senzer (Danheiser Lab) gives talk “Synthetic Approaches to (+)-CC-1065”

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

A row of students, postdocs, and faculty smile in front of a wall.

L-R: Dr. Forrest FitzGerald (Raines Lab), Kwangwook Ko(Johnson Lab), Prof. Scott Denmark, Molly Warndorf (Swager Lab), Erika Zhang (Raines Lab), Collette Gordon (Swager Lab)

Photographed: MIT Chemistry

MIT Chemistry Hosts 8th Annual Denmark Organic Retreat, Sponsored by Scott Denmark (SB ’75)

by Department of Chemistry |
Categories: Events, Faculty, Postdocs, Staff, Students

The 8th Annual Denmark Organic Retreat, sponsored by Scott Denmark (SB '75), was held on June 20, 2025.

The MIT Department of Chemistry welcomed members of its organic chemistry community to Walker Memorial’s Morss Hall for the 8th Annual Denmark Organic Retreat, a day dedicated to research presentations, collaboration, and community building. The event was generously sponsored by Scott Denmark (SB ’75), Reynold C. Fuson Professor of Chemistry at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Denmark, a Lynbrook, New York native, earned his SB from MIT in 1975, conducting research with Professors Richard H. Holm and Daniel S. Kemp. He completed his ScD at ETH Zürich under Professor Albert Eschenmoser in 1980 before joining the University of Illinois faculty, where he quickly rose through the ranks to be named Reynold C. Fuson Professor in 1991.

Established in 2017, the Denmark Organic Retreat fosters collaboration among MIT’s organic chemistry research groups through student talks, poster sessions, and networking opportunities. Faculty advisors nominate one graduate student per group to present their research, highlighting the department’s breadth of innovation.

This year’s retreat was organized under the leadership of Professor Alexander T. Radosevich, with support from Corrie Lefebvre, Director of Development, and the Organic Chemistry Retreat Committee:s: Elise Ackerman (Jeremiah Johnson Lab), Collette Gordon (Swager Lab), Kwangwook Ko (Jeremiah Johnson Lab), Hsuan-Min Hung (Buchwald and Pentelute Labs, Hallie Trial (Kiessling Lab), Molly Warndorf (Swager Lab), Erika Zhang (Raines Lab).

2025 Organic Retreat Presentations

  • MIDA Boronates as Prodrugs
    Forrest G. FitzGerald, Jasmin M. Frei, Ronald Raines
  • Intercepting a Mycobacterial Biosynthetic Pathway with Covalent Labeling 
    Teddy Warner, Kiessling Group
  • Synthesis and Fabrication of Hydrophobic Conjugated Polymers for Environmental Sensing Applications
    Collette T. Gordon, Michael U. Ocheje, Timothy M. Swager
  • 1,2-O-Atom Migration Enabled by directed Radical Generation
    Qian Xu, Alison Wendlandt  
  • Boron-Doped Heptacenes
    Jinhyo Hwang, Robert J. Gilliard
  • Total Synthesis of Complex Aspidosperma-Aspidosperma Alkaloids 
    Robert-Cristian Raclea, Mohammad Movassaghi 
  • Cu-Catalyzed Amination of Aryl Chlorides
    Han-Jun Ai, Stephen L. Buchwald 
  • Visible light-driven reductive N-arylation of nitroarenes via P(III)/P(V) catalysis
    Bora Kang, Alexander Radosevich
  • Metal organic cage polymer hybrids
    Eduard Bobylev, Jeremiah Johnson 
  • Synthetic Approaches to (+)-CC-1065
    Benjamin Senzer, Rick Danheiser

2025 Organic Retreat Poster Sessions

  • Expanding Amide Reactivity: Late-Stage Interconversions to Diverse Functional Groups
    Alexander Mueller, Masha Elkin
  • Engineering Conformational Ensembles to Control Molecular Properties
    Nate Somers, Masha Elkin
  • Automated Flow Synthesis of Artificial Enzymes for Enantioselective Biocatalysis
    Dennis Kutateladze, Stephen L. Buchwald, Bradley L. Pentelute
  • Combining Predictivity Tests and Kinetic Modeling for Mechanism Elucidation in Pd-catalyzed C-N Coupling
    Jakob Dahl, Stephen L. Buchwald
  • Next Generation Diazo Compounds for the Stabilized Esterification of Biomolecules
    Erika Zhang, Ronald T. Raines
  • Characterization of Novel Sugar Polymerase to Understand Bacterial Cell Wall Assembly
    Hallie Trial, Laura L. Kiessling
  • Selective Wall Teichoic Acid Labeling via Metabolic Incorporation
    Gerard Porter, Laura L. Kiessling 
  • Pentiptycene ether sulfone macromonomers for the synthesis of polymers of intrinsic microporosity
    Ashton Davis, Timothy M. Swager
  • Rapid Colorimetric Detection of N-Nitrosodimethylamine in Water Using Photochemical Assays
    Chi-Hsien Wang, Timothy M. Swager 
  • Cleavable Strand-Fusing Cross-Linkers as Additives for Chemically Deconstructable Thermosets with Preserved Thermomechanical Properties
    Mark Zhang, Jeremiah Johnson
  • Automated Fast-Flow Peptide Synthesizers Enable Access to Single Domain Proteins
    Jordan Bench, David Sarabia, Julien Senecal, Andrei Loas, Bradley L Pentelute