Katherine Beck, PhD

Dr. Katherine Beck is a Science Advisor and USPTO-registered patent agent in Goodwin’s Life Sciences group. Her practice focuses on drafting and prosecuting patent applications, as well as performing IP diligence, patentability, freedom-to-operate, and competitive landscape analyses to aid in investment strategy and corporate deals for investors and clients in the life sciences. Her technical expertise spans small-molecule organic chemistry; medicinal chemistry; pharmaceuticals/formulations; catalysis and catalyst design; lipid, ADC, peptide, and RNA technologies; molecular biology; and neuroscience.

Prior to joining Goodwin, Dr. Beck was a patent agent at Choate, Hall & Stewart in Boston. 

She received her PhD in organic chemistry from Columbia University, where her doctoral research focused on the development of novel methodologies in photoredox catalysis. In collaboration with global biopharma companies, she applied advanced photophysical principles to synthesize new libraries of transition metal catalysts activatable by low-energy wavelengths of light to demonstrate first-in-class cross-coupling and reactivity of pharmacophores and commercially relevant drug scaffolds, publishing multiple peer-reviewed articles. While a graduate student at Columbia, she also participated in conferences, received international awards, and was an invited speaker at conferences and research outreach initiatives.

Prior to her PhD, Dr. Beck was a Senior Research Support Associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she developed and optimized tissue preservation techniques for rodent and mammalian brains and facilitated scientific collaborations with industry and academic labs. She completed her undergraduate studies at Cornell University, double-majoring in Chemistry and Psychology, and was a recipient of research and service-based fellowships.

Publications

• Co-author, Photoredox-Catalyzed d-Aminomethylation of Trifluoroacetamides with Oximes as Radical Traps. (2026) Manuscript submitted.
• Co-author, From Structure to Function: Designing Iridium Catalysts with Spin-Forbidden Excitation for Low-Energy Light-Driven Reactions. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2025, 147 (15), 12511-12522.
• Co-author, Uniform volumetric single-cell processing for organ-scale molecular phenotyping. Nat. Biotechnol. 2025, 43, 2031-2042.
• Co-author, Dual Nickel/Photoredox-Catalyzed Aryl Etherification Enabled by an Oxidative Near-Infrared-to-Blue Triplet–Triplet Annihilation Upconversion System Leveraging Spin-Forbidden Excitation. ACS Catal. 2024, 14 (24), 18515-18522.
• First author, A Unified Method for Oxidative and Reductive Decarboxylative Arylation with Orange-Light-Driven Ir/Ni Metallaphotoredox Catalysis. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2024, 146 (37), 25780-25787.
• First author, Orange Light-Driven C(sp2)–C(sp3) Cross-Coupling via Spin-Forbidden Ir(III) Metallaphotoredox Catalysis. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2023, 145 (36), 19925-19931.
• Co-author, Red-Shifting Blue Light Photoredox Catalysis for Organic Synthesis: A Graphical Review. SynOpen 2023, 07 (01), 76-87.
• Co-author, Tuning the Electrochemical and Photophysical Properties of Osmium-Based Photoredox Catalysts. Synlett 2022, 33 (03), 247-258.
• Co-author, Functional dissection of neural circuitry using a genetic reporter for fMRI. Nat. Neurosci. 2022, 25, 390-398.

Speaking Engagements

Dr. Beck’s recent speaking engagements include:

Graduate student award recipient and speaker, “Orange Light-Driven C(sp2)-C(sp3) Cross-Coupling via Spin-Forbidden Ir(III) Metallaphotoredox Catalysis,” International Precious Metals Institute 48th Annual Conference, Orlando, FL (2024)

Invited speaker, “Orange Light-Driven C(sp2)-C(sp3) Cross-Coupling via Spin-Forbidden Ir(III) Metallaphotoredox Catalysis,” Synthesis Workshop (2024)

Presenter, “Orange Light-Driven C(sp2)-C(sp3) Cross-Coupling via Spin-Forbidden Ir(III) Metallaphotoredox Catalysis,” American Chemical Society Fall Conference, San Francisco, CA (2023)

Invited speaker, “Orange Light-Driven C(sp2)-C(sp3) Cross-Coupling via Spin-Forbidden Ir(III) Metallaphotoredox Catalysis,” Women in Chemistry/Merck Virtual Symposium (2023)

Presenter, “SHIELD protocols for scalable tissue protection and imaging,” Society for Neuroscience Conference, Chicago, IL (2019)