Michel Weïwer

Michel Weïwer, Ph.D.

Michel Weïwer

Michel Weïwer is a medicinal chemist II at the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research at Broad Institute, where he works on developing small molecules that modulate the activity of target genes involved in the development and progression of psychiatric diseases such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and depression. The ultimate goal is to translate the recent understanding of the genetic basis of schizophrenia into new therapeutic approaches and drugs to treat this disorder.

Weïwer received his master’s degree and Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Nice-Sophia Antipolis, Nice (France) under the supervision of Dr. Elisabet Dunach. His research focus was olefin functionalization with oxygen and sulfur nucleophiles using Lewis and Bronsted superacid catalysis. His postdoctoral training in carbohydrate chemistry took place at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute under the supervision of Robert J. Linhardt, working on the total synthesis of non-natural UDP-sugars as substrates for glycosyltransferases for the chemoenzymatic synthesis of heparin. He also studied the total synthesis of C-glycosides and N-glycosides of sialic acids as potential anti-influenza treatment. Subsequently, he undertook a second postdoctoral fellowship at the Broad Institute in the MLPCN program under the supervision of Stuart Schreiber and Michael Foley, working on probe development for multiple cancer targets such as Ras, STK33, MCL1, A1, Erg, esBAF, MITF, NFκB, and sonic hedgehog.

He subsequently put his expertise in organic and medicinal chemistry to work at the Stanley Center toward development of selective HDAC inhibitors, GSK3α and GSK3β selective inhibitors, and β-arrestin biased antagonists of the dopamine D2 receptor (D2R). Weïwer’s additional skill sets include carbohydrate chemistry, structure-based drug design, GPCRs, kinases, and histone deacetylases.

Contact Michel Weïwer via email at mweiwer@broadinstitute.org

October 2015