Please welcome Dr. Blaik Hopewell to the Whitney Laboratory! Blaik is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Loesgen Lab.
Blaik earned his B.Sc. in chemistry with a concentration in pharmacology at the University of Montana is 2020. He worked under Dr. Nigel Priestley conducting organic synthesis of antibiotic compounds derived from the natural product nonactin. Blaik went on to complete his PhD in synthetic organic chemistry at Oregon State University in 2026, studying under Dr. Paul Blakemore. His thesis research was on the total synthesis of the cytotoxic natural product mensacarcin. Blaik is joining the Loesgen lab to explore semisynthetic modifications of mensacarcin and isolation of other bioactive secondary metabolite natural products from marine microbes.
Outside of the lab, Blaik enjoys skiing, paddleboarding, hiking, and cooking.