Rod Rickards

Rickards has made structural, stereochemical, biochemical and synthetic contributions to the chemistry of biologically active natural products. Among the most significant compounds studied are the macrolide, glutarimide and ansamycin antibiotics from soil microorganisms of the genus Streptomyces. Research on the complex macrolide lactones, which are important in human antibacterial and antifungal therapy, led in 1970 to the definition of the structure of nystatin, the first of the polyene macrolides to be discovered and used clinically for over twenty-five years. Recent work includes the synthesis from phenol of key chiral intennediates in the preparation of the biologically important prostaglandins.

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