My Intellectual Property practice focuses on patent litigation, patent application drafting and prosecution, patentability opinions, freedom-to-operate opinions, and patent portfolio analysis and advice. I have a technical background in medicinal chemistry, small molecule drug design, synthetic organic chemistry and drug development. This background provides a deep understanding of the challenges, pitfalls and problems associated with producing pharmaceuticals and the issues associated with their patentability and marketing. I received a B.S. in chemistry and a Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. After spending a number of years working as a research scientist, I received my J.D., cum laude, from North Carolina Central University in 2014. I am currently Counsel - Intellectual Property at Katten Muchin Rosenman, where I work on both patent litigation and patent prosecution. My patent prosecution practice has expanded beyond medicinal chemistry to include a wide variety of chemical matters, mechanical, and device patent applications. Prior to joining Katten Law, I spent three years working at Alston & Bird, where I specialized in drafting and prosecuting patent applications mainly in the chemistry space.Before joining Alston & Bird, I spent 15 years working in the pharmaceutical industry as a medicinal chemist, focusing on preclinical small molecule drug research. My experience includes a variety of pharmaceutical work environments, from small biotech to large pharma. My work provided significant contributions in oncology, immunology, cardiovascular, epilepsy and pain-focused projects for a variety of molecular targets. I have been published numerous times in scientific journals and am a named co-inventor on several pharmaceutical patent applications.