Christophe Copéret is at the Department of Chemistry, ETH Zurich in Switzerland, where he works on functional materials with applications in catalysis, molecular recognition, imaging and microelectronics.

1. What made you want to be a chemist?

When I was a kid, I read books from my older brothers, and one of them discussed about possible jobs in the world of adults! I was struck by a section dealing with “ingénieur chimiste”, because that job dealt with making complex structures and processes using small Legos, named molecules. This was definitely one of the key reasons for me to become a chemist, and this was further motivated over the years by very good and rigorous high-school teachers in physics and chemistry.

2. If you weren’t a chemist and could do any other job, what would it be – and why?

I would certainly love to be a historian and a sociologist, because I am fascinating by the history of human beings, but a more realistic alternative would be to be a chef.

3. What are you working on now, and where do you hope it will lead?

We are dealing with the understanding of chemistry occurring at the surfaces of materials. We hope we can reach the level of precision of today’s molecular biology and chemistry with complex inorganic systems in such a way that we can design very complex functional materials via a molecular approach like we currently do with molecules.

4. Which historical figure would you most like to have dinner with – and why?

I would be thrilled to be able to have dinner with Tocqueville; he had an amazing foresight of political systems regarding the advantages and disadvantages of different democratic systems, while he was working for the King of France. His views were so clear at the time that they are still applicable today, explaining most of our current world turbulences.

5. When was the last time you did an experiment in the lab – and what was it?

A few weeks ago, helping students with glass-blowing (a very important technique in our lab and a good way to relax between proposal and manuscript writing!).

6. If exiled on a desert island, what one book and one music album would you take with you?

Choosing is always difficult, I guess I would go with the collection “A la recherche du temps perdu” from Marcel Proust and if I had to take a single book it would be the last volume “Le temps retrouvé”.

Concerning music, it would be a piece of one the Russian composers, and I would then probably pick the piano concerto n°3 from Rachmaninov.

7. Which chemist would you like to see interviewed on Reactions – and why?

This would certainly be among emerging scientists. I would thus pick within close collaborators and friends, with whom I have enjoyed discussing chemistry: Olivier Maury from ENS Lyon, specialist of luminescent molecules and materials, and Chloé Thieuleux from CPE Lyon, experts in material chemistry.

Mark Muldoon is in the School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at Queen’s University Belfast, Northern Ireland, and his research is focused on transition metal catalysis and developing sustainable catalytic processes.

1. What made you want to be a chemist?

According to my parents, from a young age I was always pestering them with questions about how things worked or why something was a certain colour etc. So perhaps unsurprisingly I always found science subjects the most interesting at school. Although I liked all of the sciences I preferred chemistry because it tries to understand things at a molecular level. I also liked the fact that it was practical subject that had real world applications and was central to pretty much everything that we have come to rely on in the developed world.

2. If you weren’t a chemist and could do any other job, what would it be – and why?

Outside of science subjects at school I also liked art, so perhaps I could try and be an architect or an artist (undoubtedly a struggling one as I wasn’t talented enough). I guess I enjoy attempting to be creative and I think from that point of view there is a lot of similarity between art and chemistry. Or if we are going for a fantasy alternative universe I would like to play basketball in the NBA or be a Scottish international footballer (although the latter would most likely mean a life of great disappointment!).

3. What are you working on now, and where do you hope it will lead?

We are working on a few different projects, but the major theme within the group is selective oxidation catalysis. Oxidation reactions are a significant challenge in many different areas of chemistry; for example even a simple transformation such as alcohol oxidation is avoided by the pharmaceutical industry when it comes to carrying out the reactions on scale. This is because methods that are commonly used on a small lab scale are not acceptable when scaled up, often because they have toxic reagents or by-products. At the moment we are trying to develop catalysts for a number of different oxidation reactions. The aim is to develop catalysts which use oxygen as the terminal oxidant and that have the qualities needed for industrial applications (e.g. catalysts which can deliver high turnover numbers and can be easily separated from the products). We hope that this will lead to such catalysts being employed on a larger scale (which would be no small feat!). In the longer term we aim to tackle even more difficult problems, for example selective C-H bond activation and energy related challenges.

4. Which historical figure would you most like to have dinner with – and why?

I think Richard Feynman would be an excellent choice; great conversation and who knows how and where the night would end!

5. When was the last time you did an experiment in the lab – and what was it?

Last week I ran a few experiments actually. During term time it is difficult to find time to run any experiments myself, but in the summer I can usually carry out the odd experiment. So recently I have been carrying out some preliminary experiments on some new copper catalysed dehydrogenation reactions.

6. If exiled on a desert island, what one book and one music album would you take with you?

This is a tricky one. In terms of books: Well I think a desert island could get pretty boring, so maybe some very difficult book which would keep me busy/puzzled for years, like Kant’s “Critique of Pure Reason”. On the other hand “100 Tasty Coconut Recipes” might be better. Again it is very hard to pick just one album to be “stuck with”, but for such a scenario perhaps “Echoes – The Best of Pink Floyd” would be a good choice as it would ensure that I am completely chilled out on this island.

7. Which chemist would you like to see interviewed on Reactions – and why?

Daniel Nocera at MIT. He is working in arguably one of the most important areas (solar splitting of water) and he delivers inspirational talks on his research and the challenges that we face regarding sustainable energy.

David Lemal is at the Department of Chemistry at Dartmouth College and works on the synthesis and chemistry of unusual organic species – both stable and short-lived – and in the mechanism of organic reactions.

1. What made you want to be a chemist?

Chemicals and their transformations first intrigued me at a young age in the form of a ChemCraft chemistry set with its colorful array of exotic solids and liquids. I graduated to a basement lab stocked with chemicals that I bought at Eimer & Amend in New York City, and a friend of the family bestowed upon me a bottle containing several pounds of potassium chlorate. Thus, with some sulfur and charcoal I was able to make as much of my own variation on gunpowder as needed.

When I reached high school, however, sports and girls eclipsed chemistry in my pantheon of interests, and taking the lone chemistry course hardly changed that. Students never got to touch a chemical, nor did the teacher, with two exceptions — he used the carbon dioxide fire extinguisher to blast students who talked in class, or doused them with ammonium hydroxide. He never gave a chemical answer to a student query. “It’s just because the good Lord made it that way” or “You’ll get it when you go to college” sufficed to handle any question.

As a premed in college, I found myself taking comparative anatomy and organic chemistry simultaneously. I didn’t enjoy cutting up animals, but I had a great time in the “orgo” lab. These experiences set me on the path to becoming a chemistry professor. As those were the days of DuPont’s “Better things for better living through chemistry,” there was added inspiration for my career choice.

2. If you weren’t a chemist and could do any other job, what would it be – and why?

Science and technology have always interested me more than any other vistas on the intellectual landscape. I would be happy as a biologist, but nowadays that would mean doing chemistry, so I must make another choice. Engineering appeals to me, especially the biomedical variety with its notable successes and bright prospects for the future.

3. What are you working on now, and where do you hope it will lead?

The focus of my research is fluorocarbon chemistry, a branch of organic chemistry in which fluorine substitutes for the hydrogens that form the “skin” of most organic molecules. Fluorocarbons differ dramatically in properties and chemical behavior from their hydrocarbon counterparts, with the result that they have found many applications in our culture for which they are uniquely well suited. The overarching goal of my work is to contribute to our understanding of the effects of fluorine substitution on organic molecules. My coworkers and I typically choose molecules that we expect to display properties and chemistry that are unusual even for fluorocarbons; e.g., highly strained, energy-rich, very reactive molecules. We then try to synthesize them in order to explore their nature and behavior.

At present, I am trying to synthesize highly fluorinated bicyclo[1.1.0]butanes. My quantum mechanical calculations predict quite remarkable reactivity for these compounds as a consequence of both the severe strain in their bonds and the character of their fluorine substituents. I look forward to testing these predictions.

4. Which historical figure would you most like to have dinner with – and why?

Marie Curie would be my choice. Garnering Nobel Prizes in both chemistry and physics is a phenomenal feat for anyone. What an accomplishment for a woman at the beginning of the 20th century! When I was very young, seeing a movie about her discovery of radium was a source of inspiration for me to pursue chemistry.

5. When was the last time you did an experiment in the lab?

This morning. A key reaction on the path to a target molecule had gone awry, yielding an unexpected product. Today’s experiment – isolating and purifying that product – was necessary for determining its structure. With that in hand, I hope to understand the errant chemistry.

6. If exiled on a desert island, what one book and one music album would you take with you?

It would depend on whether I was marooned on, or luxuriating on that island. If the former, I would take along a copy of Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken, a wonderful story about survival under unbelievably difficult conditions. If luxuriating, I might opt instead for Kumar’s Quantum, a fascinating history of 20th century physics focusing on the decades-long dispute between Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr over the nature of reality. As for a music album, I would choose a selection of top hits from the great broadway musicals.

7. Which chemist would you like to see interviewed on Reactions – and why?

Albert Eschenmoser. Deserving of a Nobel Prize for his highly creative work on the synthesis of Vitamin B12, not to mention his many other impressive contributions to synthetic and mechanistic organic chemistry, Professor Eschenmoser is also a gracious, generous, unassuming man with a fine sense of humor. There is no one in our profession that I admire more.

OR – Edward C. Taylor. Now the A. Barton Hepburn Professor of Chemistry Emeritus at Princeton University, Ted has capped a highly productive and distinguished career with the discovery, in conjunction with Eli Lilly, of Alimta, a blockbuster anticancer drug. Exuberant and vigorous at age 88, he could pass for 60. It is really hard not to envy this guy!

Marina Kuimova is in the Department of Chemistry at Imperial College London, and works on photophysics, spectroscopy and fluorescence imaging of dyes in live biological cells.

1. What made you want to be a chemist?

I was always keen on science at school, but chemistry was not a favourite for a long time, I much preferred physics and maths. I guess in the first instance my interest in chemistry was stimulated when I turned up at a chemistry afterschool class and realised I can not solve even the easiest of extracurricular problems. In the end, I have my hurt pride on that occasion, as well as the excellent and inspirational teacher of that class, to thank for my deciding to study chemistry at the Moscow State University. However I also kept my interest in physics and maths alive as I became a physical chemist!

2. If you weren’t a chemist and could do any other job, what would it be – and why?

I think I am quite good at persuading people, so perhaps I could make a decent lawyer. Either that or a saleswoman!!

3. What are you working on now, and where do you hope it will lead?

We are trying to develop and characterise the series of small fluorescent molecules called ‘molecular rotors’. These molecular rotors show a marked change in fluorescence (spectra, lifetimes) depending on the viscosity of their environment. The hope is that once incubated within live cells, the fluorescence detected from ‘molecular rotors’ will help us understand more about the properties of the intracellular environment and the role of viscosity in important biological processes.

4. Which historical figure would you most like to have dinner with – and why?

I have to say Richard Feynman. He is such a charismatic figure in science and a great populariser of Physics, so much so that his explanations make even the most complicated phenomena interesting and related to life. I’d like to know how he managed to do it. My parents have The Feynman Lectures on Physics standing next to Shakespeare, so I can not guarantee my Dad wasn’t reading it to me instead of nursery rhymes or Grimm’s fairy tales when I was little.

5. When was the last time you did an experiment in the lab – and what was it?

A couple of weeks ago – me and my student tried to measure the singlet oxygen quantum yield of a new fluorescent dye, which appears to kill cells. Since we have detected none, we now need to look for another reactive species responsible for this dye’s toxicity!

6. If exiled on a desert island, what one book and one music album would you take with you?

The difficulty is to choose just one. If it is really just one book I’d go for ‘Master and Margarita’ by Mikhail Bulgakov. I read this book so many times I am pretty sure I can read it many more. This will be closely followed by Catch 22 and Catcher in the Rye.

I really love classical music, but prefer to listen to it live, so the CD will have to be The Doors or Don McLean (American Pie).

7. Which chemist would you like to see interviewed on Reactions – and why?

Peter Ogilby from Aarhus University is someone I know will give excellent and original answers to these questions.

The first thing most people think of when they hear ‘arsenic’ is ‘poison’. In fact, it has played such a crucial part in many a high-profile murder throughout history that it used to be called ‘poudre de succession’ in French (inheritance powder) — mostly by women, according to the French Wikipédia page (!)

This month (subscription required), Katherine Haxton from Keele University — who also blogs at Endless Possibilities and can be found on Twitter @kjhaxton — explains why arsenic is a particularly suitable element to illustrate the notion that chemicals might be good or bad depending on their use. And so, as arsenic was inheritance powder for the French, Victorians across the Channel in Britain used it for more entertaining purposes — such as self-medication, for example to improve breathing and stamina, to freshen the skin, as an aphrodisiac, and perhaps even an anti-eczema cream by Charles Darwin.

Although organoarsenic coumpounds were prepared as early as the 1750s, their structures remained elusive until the mid-nineteenth century when Bunsen, with some help from Berzelius, identified tetra-methyl-di-arsane — a “fuming liquid with a strong garlic odour” (maybe this is why it remained elusive for so long!).

Although this sounds surprising arsenic has been used in medicine throughout history. Cyclic compounds with As–As bonds for example went on to become relatively efficient drugs against syphilis, especially after a bit of optimization to reduce some side effects and improve handling procedures (air sensitive compounds weren’t the easiest to administer). But despite medical uses, arsenic — fairly abundant in nature, and present in living systems — can readily make its way into ground water and poison large populations. Yet it seems that in 19^th century Austria, people could have consumed about 300 mg of arsenic (more than 4-times the fatal dose) without dropping dead. Could organisms get used to arsenic? Kids, don’t try this at home.

This is a topic that has been thoroughly discussed in light of a recent Science paper describing a bacterium that can supposedly grow by using arsenic instead of phosphorus. Since its publication, it has been widely — and passionately — debated in many venues, including press conferences, magazines, the Internet and as follow-up Technical Comments in Science, and was even mentioned on Nature Chemistry’s very own Blogroll.

Saviour or killer? Check out the article for other anecdotes about arsenic’s ambivalence!

Anne

Anne Pichon (Associate Editor, Nature Chemistry)

C.N.R. Rao is at the CSIR Centre for Excellence in Chemistry, New Chemistry Unit and International Centre for Materials Science, Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research; and the Indian Institute of Science; Bangalore, India, and works in solid state and materials chemistry.

1. What made you want to be a chemist?

I got interested in chemistry when I was very young because of the wonderful teachers I had at school. In fact, the best teachers in chemistry I had were in high school rather than in college. I really enjoyed the demonstrations in the class room and also benefitted from the kindness that some of them showed me by allowing me to do experiments with them. Just after I finished my undergraduate studies in 1951, I read Nature of the Chemical Bond by Linus Pauling for the first time. I found the book to be exciting. I felt that I must do research in chemistry of the kind described in the book. Linus Pauling has been my hero ever since. Another hero from my childhood has been Michael Faraday who continues to amaze me with the kind of science he did in the 19th century, publishing so many original papers single handedly. I felt that I must become a chemist like these great men when I was 17 years old.

2. If you weren’t a chemist and could do any other job, what would it be – and why?

If I were not a chemist, I do not know what else I would have been. I would have probably been a medical doctor doing research on diseases of various kinds that afflict mankind in poor countries. When I was young, even the cattle population in the interior parts of my state had become static, because a majority of animals and humans died of cholera, malaria or smallpox.

3. What are you working on now, and where do you hope it will lead?

I have been working in solid state and materials chemistry for more than 50 years. When I started working on the chemistry of solids in the 1950’s, there were very few practitioners of the subject. I wanted to work in an area where I could make meaningful contributions and one that was not too crowded. Furthermore, I had to pick an area in which I could do something reasonable with the very meager facilities available at that time in India. Solid state chemistry seemed best even though I did not have good X-ray or spectroscopic facilities. I have carried out research on various aspects of the chemistry of materials all these years. I am now working on multiferroics and various types of oxide materials as well as graphene, carbon nanotubes and other nanomaterials. Some of the problems that I have got interested in the last two to three years relate to splitting of water, hydrogen storage and dealing with CO2.

4. Which historical figure would you most like to have dinner with – and why?

If I had the freedom of choice of having dinner with a historical figure, my first choice to be Faraday and my second choice would be G.N. Lewis, one from the 19th century and another from the 20th century.

5. When was the last time you did an experiment in the lab – and what was it?

I have not done many experiments myself in recent years, but whenever I get a chance, I do go to the laboratory and turn a knob here and there. When I have gone on academic leave to institutions outside India, I have carried out experiments.

6. If exiled on a desert island, what one book and one music album would you take with you?

If I were to be lost in a desert island, I would like to have the great Indian epic Mahabharata (which includes the Gita) with me. For music, I would have a collection of Indian classical vocal music by Bhimsen Joshi; for western music, I would have Mozart.

7. Which chemist would you like to see interviewed on Reactions – and why?

I would pick two people, my friend from Israel, Joshua Jortner, and Paul Haggenmuller from France. Jortner is one of the first chemists to work on electron transfer. Hagenmuller is one of the early solid state chemists.

*Posted on behalf of Matthew Salter, who is the Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of the Asia-Pacific branch of Macmillan Scientific Communications — a custom publishing division of Macmillan.

Bittersweet /bɪtəˈswiːt/ (adj.)

1. sweet with a bitter aftertaste.

2. arousing pleasure tinged with sadness or pain.

3. hearing the news that the chemistry department at King’s College London is to reopen.

The news arrived casually in an iPhone email from a friend and former KCL postgraduate in reply to one I had sent attaching a photo of the stunning building that houses the Italian Cultural Centre in Tokyo. “Thanks for the picture” came the reply, “That’s awesome. BTW I guess you know about this?”

The “this” in question was a link to the advert for the Daniell Chair and Head of Department of Chemistry at King’s College London, a department which, as far as I was knew, was very dead indeed.

As a chemist, you would have expected my heart to have skipped a beat at the felicitous news that such a cherished institution — whose closure in 2003 sparked outrage in the UK chemistry community — was to be resurrected. Yet I had mixed feelings on cheering the return of this historic department, with a pedigree in chemistry dating back to 1830.

Don’t get me wrong — this is certainly a welcome development that flies in the face of the depressing national trend in chemistry. My misplaced chagrin was most likely due to the fact that in 2003 I was a lecturer in organic chemistry at KCL, and therefore had the dubious honour of participating in the vigorous but ultimately futile attempt to avert the department’s closure. And although eight years have passed my feelings, at least, are still raw.

Instead of excitement on hearing the news my thoughts were all of endless impassioned meetings with college authorities and the College Council (who seemed deaf to our entreaties and blind to reason) of anguished discussions at departmental staff meetings as we tried to figure out how we would minimize the damage to the academic future of our students, and equally anguished discussions in offices and after work in the pub as we tried to figure out how to minimize the damage to our own academic careers. Then there was the final meeting where the official closure verdict was delivered, a gathering to which I felt that I had only been invited in order to identify the body.

Although teaching at the department continued for another two years, and the remaining staff did their level best to help those students who had stayed on to graduate, there was always the feeling that this was the last act. When the doors finally closed, a close-knit, talented and committed band of researchers had been disbursed, the labs were silenced and a department with 175 years of history behind it had been “disappeared”. And that was that.

We hated it. We were angry about it. We were sad about it. We couldn’t understand it (some of us still can’t). But we had no choice but to accept it.

And now, as if by magic, with one click of a mouse button, chemistry at King’s is back. The situation is not as encouraging as it appears at first glance: the chemists in the new Department will be drawn from a wide range of principle disciplines scattered across the college’s campuses (although the college is making noises about establishing a “physical hub”) and the undergraduate degree will be in Chemistry with Biomedicine. But at least KCL is learning to use the C-word again.

And that’s got to be good – right? I’m happy about it, really, I am. Here’s hoping that this is the first step towards a full resurrection of chemistry at King’s College London which is, despite everything, a remarkable and unique institution of whose staff I was proud to be a member.

I just wish I could shake off this feeling of sadness at the waste of the last eight years, and stop wondering whether, if things had turned out differently, I wouldn’t have to describe myself as a former chemistry lecturer.

Matthew Salter

Ken Cham-Fai Leung is with the Center of Novel Functional Molecules, Department of Chemistry at the Chinese University of Hong Kong but in transit to The Institute of Creativity and Department of Chemistry at the Hong Kong Baptist University. He works on nanoparticle research and supramolecular chemistry targeted for biomedical applications.

1. What made you want to be a chemist?

I always amazed by the beauty of naturally occurred, complex molecules that possess specific functions. My curiosities drive me to understand their total synthesis and how modifications of these molecules alter their functions, trying to be acquainted with the origin of life too.

2. If you weren’t a chemist and could do any other job, what would it be – and why?

I would like to be a chef in hotel or restaurant. I think there are some similarities between experimental chemistry and cooking, and molecular gastronomy has been coined recently with many creativities. I wish to taste and characterize my own experimental products, e.g. healthier desserts, that I made up in the kitchen by tasting. It is a pleasure to share with my friends (who love eating!) if they taste good.

3. What are you working on now, and where do you hope it will lead?

I am now working on the developments of inorganic/organic hybrid nanomaterials for magnetic resonance imaging, fluorescent imaging, and controlled drug delivery. I hope that my students are interested and well trained in this field, then contribute to society.

4. Which historical figure would you most like to have dinner with – and why?

I would like to have dinner with Antonie van Leeuwenhoek who used the microscope to discover microorganisms. I would like to share his experience and feelings on seeing such novel microscopic world at that time. I also wish to let him know that now we have electron microscope for observing the nano- and atomic world as well.

5. When was the last time you did an experiment in the lab – and what was it?

I measured contact angles of nanomaterial on surface and synthesized core/shell nanoparticles with different functional molecules about a week ago. I like performing experiments and optimizing them.

6. If exiled on a desert island, what one book and one music album would you take with you?

It is quite difficult to choose only one book and one music album. I have too many favorites. In this case, I will take The Bible and Bon Jovi’s Crossroad, which can cheer me up and so I will try to turn a desert into an oasis.

7. Which chemist would you like to see interviewed on Reactions – and why?

I wish to see Professor David Leigh, who has been doing some interesting and creative chemistries at the University of Edinburgh, interviewed on Reactions with all these good questions.

Andrei K. Yudin is in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Toronto and works on chemical synthesis of functionally significant molecules.

1. What made you want to be a chemist?

Way before I got interested in chemistry I had started drawing and painting. This is where my passion was then and continues to be now (besides science). When I got exposed to organic chemistry I realized that my drawing skills were really helping me in class. I was completely “sold” when I found out that it was possible to represent chemical properties by using neatly drawn abstractions such as chemical structures.

2. If you weren’t a chemist and could do any other job, what would it be – and why?

There is no doubt in my mind that it would be fine arts. I do this regularly even now by attending weekly life drawing sessions at the Toronto School of Arts and the Arts Gallery of Ontario. This is what I will do 100% when (and if) I retire.

3. What are you working on now, and where do you hope it will lead?

We are working on the so-called amphoteric molecules. They contain counterintuitive combinations of mutually exclusive functional groups (for instance – an amine and an aldehyde). It is a simple concept but the resulting reagents help us design effective syntheses with high bond forming efficiency. In terms of applications, our current focus is on what we like to call cycloinformatics. It deals with the emergence of functionally significant folded structures out of large macrocyclic molecules. We want to be in a position to offer synthetic processes that will help define rules that govern both protein target selectivity and cell permeability of protein fold mimetics.

4. Which historical figure would you most like to have dinner with – and why?

This will have to be Paul Cezanne. He had a rare gift to discern similar tonal values among different colors. In his work, Cezanne was able to create an infallible perception of depth using tone alone, by making a mosaic of tiny brush strokes of color. There was a rhythm in his brushstrokes, you can see it and feel it. His colors vibrate after all these years and nothing is ever static in his work. Towards the end of his life he foreshadowed cubism through his use of tonal values (take a look at his late Mt. St. Victoire paintings). This is whom Picasso (whom I like but am not too passionate about) learned cubism from.

5. When was the last time you did an experiment in the lab – and what was it?

I love synthetic electrochemistry. The last time I ran a reaction (sadly) was about 9 years ago. We plugged two platinum electrodes into an acetonitrile solution (with some supporting electrolyte) and made an oxidized heterocycle. I will probably go back to that soon since students really shy away from electrosynthesis and I want to keep convincing them (haha – every 9 years!) that there is not much to it, really.

6. If exiled on a desert island, what one book and one music album would you take with you?

As far as music I would take Prokofiev’s violin concertos (with Oistrakh) and Shostakovich’s 24 preludes and Fugues (by Nikolaeva). In terms of a book – it would be Sholokhov’s “Tihii Don” (in Russian, it will be “Quiet Flows the Don” in English).

7. Which chemist would you like to see interviewed on Reactions – and why?

I would suggest Bruce Maryanoff. He is someone who has a ton of great science stories to tell about how medicinal chemistry is done. He is also a great connoisseur of wine and I am hoping he will share a few anecdotes as well! I would also suggest my good friend Christophe Coperet, who is working in the area of heterogeneous catalysis and has done some wonderful work there (by coincidence, also a real expert in wine!).