Michael (“Mick”) Sherburn is Professor of Organic Chemistry at the Australian National University. Born and educated in England, he earned his B.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Nottingham, where he conducted doctoral research in free-radical chemistry under Prof. John Murphy. After completing postdoctoral studies on gibberellin natural products with Prof. Lew Mander at ANU, he began his independent career at Massey University in New Zealand. In 1997, he joined the University of Sydney, and in 2003, he returned to ANU as a Senior Fellow (Associate Professor). His research combines total synthesis with the design, synthesis, and study of new hydrocarbons—particularly acyclic π-bond-rich systems—and the development of efficient methods for the rapid assembly of complex polycyclic structures. The overarching goal of this work is to link fundamental hydrocarbon chemistry with target-oriented synthesis.
