Dr Elizabeth Krenske

Biography

Dr Elizabeth Krenske undertook her PhD in the field of synthetic main-group chemistry at The Australian National University's Research School of Chemistry, where she worked with Professor Bruce Wild. After two years of postdoctoral research at the ANU she was awarded a Fulbright Postdoctoral Scholarship and spent two years at the University of California, Los Angeles, working in the field of theoretical and computational chemistry with Professor Kendall Houk. She returned to Australia in 2009 as an ARC Australian Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Melbourne, and moved to The University of Queensland in 2012 as an ARC Future Fellow. She currently holds a Senior Lectureship in the UQ School of Chemistry and Molecular Biosciences and is a 2017 UQ Strategic Research Fellow. Most recently her research has been featured in the inaugural Young Investigator issue of the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

Research Interest

Dr Krenske's laboratory uses computer simulations to address a range of challenges associated with the invention of new chemical technologies. Her laboratory's research utilises advanced molecular modelling techniques to uncover atomic-level insights into molecular behaviour, focussing in particular on the transition states and reactive intermediates that are crucial to the outcomes of chemical reactions but are often difficult to detect by experimental means. The fundamental information generated by these sophisticated simulations is being used to help design more efficient synthetic chemical reactions and to discover molecules with the potential to modulate the behaviour of biomolecular therapeutic targets. Current research activities in Dr Krenske's laboratory include: 1. In silico explorations of the fundamental reaction mechanisms of newly-invented synthetic organic reactions; 2. Development of computer-based technologies for the design of new chiral catalysts for asymmetric synthesis; 3. Modelling and prediction of drug-biomolecule interactions and their roles in drug efficacy and toxicity; and 4. Computational predictions of molecular spectroscopic properties for natural products structure determination and optoelectronic materials design.