Junqi was born and raised in Singapore. After receiving her B.Sc. and M.Sc. in chemistry from National University of Singapore, she pursued her graduate studies with Professor Martin Burke at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, where she focused on developing a more systematized approach for automating small molecule synthesis via iterative coupling of MIDA boronate building blocks. She subsequently became a postdoctoral associate under the joint supervision of Professors Dean Toste and Scott Miller at University of California, Berkeley and Yale University respectively, working on enantio- and site-selective reactions with phosphoric acid catalysts. She joined the chemistry faculty at Iowa State University in August 2019.
AWARDS
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
2017 ACS Nobel Laureate Signature Award for Graduate Education in Chemistry
2012 Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) International Student Research Fellowship
2012 Bristol-Myers Squibb Graduate Fellowship in Synthetic Organic Chemistry
2011 R. C. Fuson Travel Award
2011 C. S. Marvel Fellowship
2010 Walter Brown Graduate Fellowship
National University of Singapore
2007 President’s Graduate Fellowship
2006 CRISP award (Best undergraduate research project in Faculty of Science)
2006 Schering-Plough Gold Medal (Best undergraduate research in Department of Chemistry)
2004 Dean’s List