Gunda I. Georg, PhD

Professor Georg and her group have published over 250 scientific articles and are involved in the design, semisynthesis, total synthesis, and evaluation of biologically active agents. Current therapeutic areas focus on male and female non-hormonal contraception and cancer.

These projects require the development of synthetic methods, and structure-activity studies aimed at improving the therapeutic efficacy of lead compounds, including hits from high throughput screening.

Interdisciplinary projects are the focus of the Georg group, involving medicinal chemistry, biochemistry, screening, structure-based drug design, computational drug design, and pharmacology. Collaborations exist with several research groups at the University of Minnesota, and around the country.

She is the co-inventor of LusedraTM, which was marketed by Eisa Pharmaceuticals. She is also co inventor of Minnelide, an anticancer agent, QLS-101 a glaucoma drug, and YCT-529, a male non-hormonal contraceptive agent, which are in clinical development.

In 2023 she received the Cal Mannich Medal of the German Pharmaceutical Society (DPhG) for service to pharmacy in Germany and for research excellence and in 2020 she received the Gilead Alfred Burger Award in Medicinal Chemistry of the American Chemical Society. The award is granted for outstanding contributions in the field of medicinal chemistry. In 2013 she received the Ernest H. Volwiler Research Achievement Award of the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy.

Professor Georg served as co-editor-in-chief of the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry of the American Chemical Society until December 2020. She is the 2024 Chair of the Medicinal Chemistry Division of the American Chemical Society. She serves on the advisory boards of the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, ACS Letters in Medicinal Chemistry, Archiv der Pharmazie, Medicinal Research Reviews, and is a co- editor for the Springer Series Topics in Medicinal Chemistry.

She has served as a member of review panels for the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, the German DFG, and the American Cancer Society, and others and has served on advisory boards for universities, and companies. 

In 2017 she was inducted into the Medicinal Chemistry Hall of Fame of the Division of Medicinal Chemistry of the American Chemical Society and named Research Exemplar by the Research Exemplar Project of Washington University in St. Louis. 

She is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Chemical Society.

Recent Named Lectures:

• 2023 David Chu Lectureship on Drug Discovery, University of Georgia
• 2023 UW-Madison/WARF Therapeutics Distinguished Lecture in Drug Discovery, University of Wisconsin Madison
• 2022 John G. Topliss Memorial Award Lectureship, University of Michigan
• 2020 Alfred Burger Award in Medicinal Chemistry of the American Chemical Society
• 2019 G. Van Greene Distinguished Lecture, Mercer University, College of Pharmacy
• 2019 3M/Ronald A. Mitsch Lecture in Chemistry. Hamlin University, Saint Paul
• 2019 Matzuk Lecture, Baylor College of Medicine
• 2018 Sigma-Aldrich Lectureship, Northwestern University, Center for Innovation and Drug Discovery
• 2017 J. Doyle Smith / Larry Winter Lecture, Virginia Commonwealth University
• 2016 Varro E. Tyler Distinguished Lecture, Purdue University College of Pharmacy and Department of Medicinal Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology
• 2015 Karcher-Barton-Aldrich Award Lecture, The University of Oklahoma, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry
• 2015 Nieuwland Lectureship, Department of Chemistry, Notre Dame University

• American Chemical Society
  • Division of Medicinal Chemistry
  • Division of Organic Chemistry
• American Association for the Advancement of Science
• American Association for Cancer Research
• International Society of Heterocyclic Chemistry
• Deutsche Pharmazeutische Gesellschaft
• Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker
  • Division of Medicinal Chemistry
• American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists
• Iota Sigma Pi
• Phi Lambda Upsilon
• Phi Beta Kappa

• German

• US7,514,463
• WO2010129918 A8
• US20140323748 A1
• WO 2015/117024A1
• WO 2016/149540 A1

PubMed

• Faber, E. B.; Tang, J.; Roberts, E.; Ganeshkumar, S.; Sun, L.; Wang, N.; Rasmussen, D.; Majumdar, D.; John, K.; Yang, A.; Khalid, H.; Hawkinson, J. E.; Levinson, N. M.; Schönbrunn, E.; Chennathukuzhi, V.; Harki. D. A.; Georg, G. I. Development of Allosteric and Selective CDK2 Inhibitors for Contraception with Negative Cooperativity to Cyclin Binding. Nat. Commun. 2023, 3213. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-38732-x
• Faber, E. B.; Wang, N.; John, K.; Sun, L.; Burban, D.; Khalid, H.; Wong, H. L.; Francis, R.; Tian, D.; Hong, W. H.; Yang, A.; Wang, L.; Elsaid, M.; Khalid, H.; Levinson, N. M.; Schönbrunn, E.; Hawkinson, J. E.; Georg, G. I. Screening Through Lead Optimization of High Affinity, Allosteric Cyclin-dependent Kinase 2 (CDK2) Inhibitors as Male Contraceptives that Reduce Sperm Counts in Mice. J. Med. Chem. 2023, 66, 1928-1940. DOI: 10.1021/acs.jmedchem.2c01731
  • Selected for cover page and ACS press release.
• Noman, M. A. A.; Cuellar, R. A. D.; Kyzer, J.; Cheryala, N.; Chung, S. S. S.; Holth, A. D.; Maitra, S.; Naqvi, T.; Hawkinson, J. E.; Schönbrunn, E.; Wong, H.; Wolgemuth, D. J.; Georg, G. I. Strategies for Developing Retinoic Acid Receptor Alpha-Selective Antagonists as Novel Agents for Male Contraception. Eur. J. Med. Chem. 2023, 261, 115821. DOI: 10.1016/j.ejmech.2023.115821
• Kyzer, J.; Chung, S. S. S.; Noman, M. A. A.; Cuellar, R. A. D.; Maitra, S.; Naqvi, T.; Hawkinson, J.; Wolgemuth, D. J.; Georg, G. I. Investigation of Retinoic Acid Receptor Alpha Antagonist ER50891 and Analogs in vitro for Potency and Selectivity and in vivo Effects of ER50891 on Spermatogenesis. Arch. Pharm. 2023, 356, e22300031. DOI: 10.1002/ardp.202300031
• Guan, X.; Cheryala, N.; Karim, R. M.; Chan, A.; Berndt, N.; Qi, J.; Georg, G. I.; Schönbrunn, E. Bivalent BET Bromodomain Inhibitors Confer Increased Potency and Selectivity for BRDT via Protein Conformational Plasticity. J. Med. Chem. 2022, 65, 10441-10458. DOI: 10.1021/acs.jmedchem.2c00453.
  • Selected for cover page
• Noman, M. A. A.; Huang, D.; Coulup, S. K.; Syeda, S. S.; Wong, H. L.; Georg, G. I. Cytotoxicity of Phenylpironetin Analogs and Metabolic Fate of Pironetin and Phenylpironetin. Bioorg. Chem. 2022, 125, 105915. DOI: 10.1016/j.bioorg.2022.105915.
• Jiang, J.; Sigua, L. H.; Chan, A.; Kalra, P.; Pomerantz, W. C. K.; Schönbrunn, E.; Qi, J.; Georg, G. I. Dihydropyridine Lactam Analogs Targeting BET Bromodomains. ChemMedChem 2022, 17, e2202100407. DOI: 10.1002/cmdc.202100407.
• Carlson, E. J.; Georg, G. I.; Hawkinson, J. E. Steroidal Antagonists of Progesterone- and Prostaglandin E 1 -Induced Activation of the Cation Channel of Sperm. Mol. Pharmacol. 2022, 101, 56-67. DOI: org/10/1124/molparm.121.000349

The Institute for Therapeutics Discovery and Development