You can look at your wrist watch and easily find the time of the day, but that says nothing about the mechanics of how the watch tells time. A chemical reaction is very similar, whereby you can mix compound A with compound B and obtain a completely new compound C. My research is interested in how that process occurs. To do this, we run quantum chemical simulations to determine the mechanism of a chemical reaction. With that information in hand we’re able to design more efficient and selective reactions. We study anything, from the formation of a chemical bond or even to the multistep synthesis of a complex organic molecule like this. So we develop models that predict and explain on one hand the electronic structure of a molecule and on the other its bonding and reactivity capabilities. By doing so, we equip researchers in academia and the industry with design principles to synthesize novel chemicals, pharmaceuticals and materials in a more efficient and ecofriendly way.