Abigail Doyle

Abigail Doyle was born in Princeton, NJ in 1980. She received her A.B. and A.M. summa cum laude in Chemistry and Chemical Biology from Harvard University in 2002. As an undergraduate, she investigated iron-catalyzed epoxidations of alkenes in collaboration with Dr. Christina White. She began her graduate studies at Stanford University working with Professor Justin Du Bois. In 2003, she transferred to Harvard University and joined the laboratory of Professor Eric Jacobsen. Her graduate research included the discovery of a transition metal-catalyzed enantioselective alkylation of tributyltin enolates with alkyl halides and the development of a thiourea catalyst for enantioselective nucleophilic additions to prochiral oxocarbenium ions. Abby began her independent career at Princeton University in 2008 and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2013, before moving to UCLA in 2021 where she is currently the Saul Winstein Chair in Organic Chemistry.

The Doyle lab conducts research at the interface of organic, organometallic, physical organic, and computational chemistry. Their goal is to address unsolved problems in organic synthesis through the development of catalysts, catalytic reactions, and synthetic methods. They apply mechanistic and computer-assisted techniques to the analysis of these reactions in order to uncover general principles that can guide the design of improved catalysts and the discovery of new reactions.