OpenEye Scientific Software

Anthony Nicholls, Ph.D., President and CEO

Anthony Nicholls is from Plymouth, England, home to what used to be one of the worst soccer teams in the nation. He studied Physics at Oxford after which, looking for something different, he joined the Institute for Molecular Biophysics at Florida State University. There he studied quantum dispersion of excitations in biological systems with William Rhodes and football with Bobby Bowden. He earned his Ph.D. in biophysics in 1988 and began a post-doc with Barry Honig at Columbia University, New York. There he re-wrote the electrostatics program DelPhi and wrote the widely-used graphics software GRASP. Owning and controlling rights to neither, he listened to the wisdom of Dave Weininger, founder of Daylight C.I.S., and left Columbia in 1997 to found OpenEye in Santa Fe, New Mexico. His chief desire is to have the work ethic of his father who, in 1996, retired as the longest serving postman in England (48.5 years).

Matthew Stahl, Ph.D., Senior Vice President

Matthew Stahl received a B.S. degree in Chemistry and Biochemistry from the University of Washington in 1991. He then attended the University of Arizona and received his Ph.D. working with Dr. Eugene Mash. Matthew's dissertation work included a modeling study of the transition states of diastereoselective nucleophilic additions to cyclopropyl ketones. Upon completion of his Ph.D. in 1995 he accepted a post-doctoral fellowship at Harvard University working for Professor E. J. Corey. Matthew then joined the Biophysics group at Vertex Pharmaceuticals, and was later promoted to Manager of ChemInformatics. In 1998, Matthew accepted a position at OpenEye Scientific Software as Chief Scientific Geek.

Prior to OpenEye he authored or co-authored Babel, Padre, Wizard III, LHASA, DEREK, XBabel, Mongoose to name but a few. At OpenEye he wrote the original version of ROCS, was one of the OEChem hive-minds and continues to develop Omega. In addition, he created OELib, that now has an independent open-source existence.

A. Geoffrey Skillman, M.D., Ph.D., VP, Research

Geoff Skillman graduated from Stanford with a degree in Chemistry in 1990. His herculean efforts at UCSF earned him a Ph.D. with Tack Kuntz in 1999 (Structure-Based Design of Combinatorial Libraries) and an M.D. in 2000 (Making People Better). Geoff enjoys hiking, climbing, swimming and threatening physical violence to Anthony, Matt and Roger when they do not play nice. Geoff was also one of the OEChem authors, wrote Omega 1.8, Filter, QuacPac, the LexiChem Plugin and now Brood. He is now in charge of scientific research at OpenEye, which just goes to show that no good deed goes unpunished.

Bob Tolbert, Ph.D., VP, Development

Bob Tolbert received a B.S. degree in Chemistry from the United States Naval Academy in 1983. Upon graduation he entered Nuclear Power training and served as an officer aboard submarines in the U. S. Navy for ten years. Bob earned a Ph.D. in Chemistry in 1997 from the University of Idaho where he worked with W. Dan Edwards studying the theory of atoms in molecules as applied to homoaromaticity. In 1998, Bob joined the Information Technology group at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc., where, as a Senior Principal Systems Engineer, he was responsible for all aspects of computational chemistry and cheminformatics. In 2002, Bob ran away to join the circus. And the circus was glad to have him. Now ringmaster to the plethora of OpenEye product, Bob continues the high-wire act of programming and managing those who program. He is responsible for the current ROCS, EON, python and java toolkits and has contributed to nearly every other program. Who said the circus was supposed to be fun?

Janet Rasmussen, VP, Finance

Janet Rasmussen, the original model for the character "Emma Peel" in the Avengers, joined OpenEye in 2003 when Mercury was in retrograde. Which explains a lot really, although none of us is sure exactly what. But we do know OpenEye has never been the same since in that people actually get paid at the end of the month rather than a random date afterwards, the words "Don't make me set Janet on you" is about the only threat from Anthony anyone takes seriously and we'd all eat even worse junk food without her. As comptroller she is supposed to keep the money we make and we all vaguely hope she isn't taking that role too literally, especially given her predilection for tropical islands. She claims to have met John Denver but we've never clarified if that was before or after his accident. Janet. R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

Joseph Corkery, M.D., VP, Business Development

Joseph Corkery received a B.S.E. degree in Computer Science from Princeton University in 1998. While at Princeton, he consulted for AT&T Consumer Labs developing HOT AIR (an automated information responder) which he brought through customer testing to a working product for AT&T WorldNet Services. After Princeton, he spent one year at Vertex Pharmaceuticals in the Molecular Modeling group developing software primarily focusing on docking, conformation analysis, library design, and user interfaces. He left Vertex to attend Harvard Medical School. During his first year he worked part-time for OpenEye developing VIDA. He elected to take a leave of absence from Harvard to join OpenEye as a full time employee starting in October 2000. In the autumn of 2002, he took a leave of absence from OpenEye to complete his M.D., but is now back with us full time. Joe is now involved in the business side of OpenEye, managing growth of sales and expectations. It was Joe's now-wife Alison who first commented on the strong sense of entitlement at OpenEye.

Krisztina Boda, Ph.D., Senior Scientific Developer

Krisztina came to us highly recommended by Johnny Gasteiger and Peter Johnson. We used to think that was because of her skills in computer science, her original training, or chemiformatics, her current specialty. But as time goes by we realize the truth is probably close to this - when she returns from visiting her family in Hungary she brings back SUCH. GOOD. CHOCOLATE. So thank you Peter, thank you Johnny, our waistlines may never be the same. Actually, she is possibly the most industrious person we've seen at OpenEye, presenting two posters to most people's one. This, unfortunately, has spurred something of a competition, with someone presenting three posters at EuroCUP III in Toledo. As we can't possibly let anyone beat us in anything, we eagerly look forward to her first four poster meeting. No pressure, Krisztina.

Lisa Chubrillo, Administrative Assistant

Lisa, Lisa, Lisa. So many stories and so little time. Let's see, raised by Gypsies she entered the Sorbonne at 15 only to get kicked out after a wild affair with a famous French existentialist. Seeking solace she studied the pack behavior of wild Chihuahua in the Mexican desert, earning her the nickname "La Dama con Tobillos Fuerte, literally, "The Dame with Tough Ankles". They still sing folksongs about her in the hills. Coming North, she agreed to work for us for free if we'd buy her tequila and the NHL sports package. We lied about the hockey so ended up paying her. Just as well, otherwise she might go back to the Sorbonne and we'd all be worse off, although existentialism might gain a new lease on life.

Brian Cole, Developer

We first met Brian while he was an undergraduate at Temple University doing part-time work at Wyeth. He claimed he was good at Aikido and after seeing him throw Matt around the room it was obvious he had a future at OpenEye. As a keen student of both Star Trek and Star Wars, he's added real cultural depth to the organization, plus his wife, aka Awesome Girl, cooks us cakes. Oh, he does do some programming and many claim he is gifted in that area. At least those who don't want to be thrown around the room. Brian has great enthusiasm for his work. His focus recently has been on multi-threaded applications and toolkits, in particular Spicoli, and on new hardware developments. He has a plan to go back to school to get his PhD, but since he can't even buy plane tickets for the right week we anticipate, and hope, this may take a while.

Tom Darden, Ph.D., Senior Scientist

Tom Darden, aka, the man who made simulations of proteins actually not look stupid. Tom, as you will recall, was responsibly for bringing Ewald sums to molecular simulation. Before that, those of us in the implicit solvent world loved to sit back and smile smugly at how the explicit solvent boys and girls could not keep a protein from unfolding if they kept running their simulations. Tom's work changed all that and so before he did any more damage, i.e. actually made simulations actually useful, we thought we had better hire him away to the desert. Here, he is our Mathematician-in-Residence, competing with Anthony to see who can have the most unread books on their shelves.

Ben Ellingson, Ph.D, Scientific Developer

Ben, who joined us in 2008, used to work at OpenEye to support his fantasy sports habit which was obviously becoming too much for his graduate stipend with Don Truhlar. Unfortunately, early in 2009 he discovered that he and his wife were going to be expecting their first child. No, make that twins. No. Make that triplets! So Ben is now working at OpenEye to save for college funds, all donations gratefully accepted. When he's not worrying about the future or cursing baseball or football players we've never heard of, Ben works primarily on toolkits, making contributions to both ZAP and Omega. At his interview talk he admitted that during his PhD he had worked through some old quantum code written in FORTRAN to discover that a matrix multiplication had for years been done in the wrong order. Boy, we thought, that would never happen at OpenEye, but we hired him anyway. Ben. Every organization needs one.

Laszlo Fusti Molnar, Ph.D, Research Scientist

Laszlo comes from a quantum background, having worked with the great Peter Pulay, briefly at Q-Chem, and also with the Dude, Kennie Merz of the Quantum Theory Project at the University of Florida. Before that he did his PhD with Peter Szalay in Hungary, proving to us that all Hungarians have to have 'sz' somewhere in their names and also Gabriel Balint-Kurti in Bristol. Laszlo is porting OpenEye software to quantum computers, i.e. computing devices that make use of the Superposition Principle to run potentially an exponential number of calculations simultaneously via Entangled Quantum States. He's also a keen tennis player and .. Ok, we have to admit, that thing about quantum computers was a joke, but he is working on some exciting projects.

Matt Geballe, Ph.D., Applications Scientist

Matt came to CUP. Matt gave a great talk. Matt now works here. 'Nuff said? He's now the SAMPL man, taking over the responsibilities that made first Ant and then Geoff realize the beauty of being able to pass the buck. But he makes it look easy, darn it. Matt hails from the 50th state (Hawaii for the historically challenged) and thinks the calm, cool, laid-back attitudes at OpenEye reminds of home. Ok, he doesn't exactly say that, but we're pretty sure that's what he thinks. While being disappointed he doesn't seem to have heard of 'Hawaii-5-0', we like him anyway. Book him, Dano.

Jeffrey S. Grandy, Senior Account Manager

The third of our sales, oops, account management trilogy, Jeff is our West Coast representative. He spent some of his early years in England, which probably accounts for his affable nature and his good taste, and has traveled extensively, sometimes with the Grateful Dead, sometimes solo. Some in the company had a hard time when he first joined in 2007 with the name collision with Geoff Skillman, although why people would think "Grandy" and "Skillman" sound the same is beyond some of us. We also hadn't anticipated his exceptional driving skills, no doubt developed during rush hour on San Francisco freeways. Who knew handbrake turns were legal on major highways? Jeff Grandy, laid-back dude, whiskey connoisseur, our guy way out West.

Paul Hawkins, Ph.D., Senior Applications Scientist

What were the odds that OpenEye would hire another Englishman after their experience with the "disagreeable duo," Anthony and Roger? Long, you might have thought, which just goes to show why bookies make their money. Paul used to work at Tripos, and when we saw him give a talk that made their software look good, we made him an offer. Paul is the first of a new breed at OpenEye, an application scientist. What we mean by that is that Paul will be helping customers do science with our applications, either by visiting them and delighting them with stories of how dysfunctional we are, or by working on examples, white-papers and publications in the home office. Paul, he's from OpenEye and he's here to help you.

Brian Kelley, M. Eng., Research Scientist/Senior Developer

Brian is a Cornell graduate with a BA in Physics and an M.Eng. in Electrical Engineering. We first got to know him when he worked at BioReason in Santa Fe, but before we could hire him he moved off to the Whitehead in Boston. Our patience is infinite, and eventually he saw the error of his ways and joined OpenEye. He lists as his interests: rowing, rock climbing, sailing and opera, which just goes to show how broad-minded we are. He also has nerves of steel, as evidenced by demonstrating Vida2 live at CUP6.

Mark McGann, Ph.D., Principal Developer

Mark McGann received his B.S. from Rensselear Polytechnic Institute in the Spring of 1993. He then spent six months as a quality assurance engineer at Rogers Materials Molding division before entering graduate school at Tulane University Chemical Engineering department in January 1994. His graduate research focused on detailed molecular simulations of polymer crystals. Mark graduated from Tulane with a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering in the fall of 1998 and took a position at the Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Research Institute where he developed fast docking programs for structure-based drug design in collaboration with OpenEye. He joined OpenEye in October 2000. Mark has the most amazing collection of video games anyone has ever seen.

Scott Parker, Senior Account Manager

Scott Parker is a Spoken Word performer who has bridged the gap between poetry and science. His dynamic style of speaking and Fire Flowpoetry combines rhythm, science, and a highly condensed depth of poetic language. His delivery on stage makes him one of the most unique and riveting performers on the U.S. scientific and artistic landscape. Scott speaks shamanically through poems of drug discovery and computational methods, tells modeling stories of the international pharmaceutical and Biotech communities, and poetically rants and rages about both Ligand-based and Structure-based drug discovery. In 2006, he was appointed as the first ever "Poet-In-Residence" at OpenEye Scientific Software, Inc., Santa Fe, New Mexico's premier computational Chemistry software provider. He has performed over 500 times in the USA with other computational companies, modeling software outfits, and as a solo poet.

Phillip Sawunyama, Ph.D., Director, Support & Training

Phillip is Mr. Support at OpenEye. He is responsible for the new bug reporting and tracking system at OpenEye, FogBugz, and for the new focus on training and documentation. He joined us in 2008 from Tripos. We always said we hired Paul Hawkins from Tripos because in his interview he made Tripos software sound cool. Well, we hired Phillip because he explained ROCS to us in a way that made us think it was cool. (Disclaimer: which, of course, it really is, but when you live with it for ten years the magic can get lost). Phillip is originally from Zimbabwe, has lived in Japan and is one of the few people in the Santa Fe office to mean football when he says "football." He's brought a new dimension to the company and anyone who can make Anthony and Roger sit in the same room and 'train' them to use something new, clearly has exceptional powers. One of those people who makes you realize OpenEye has come a long way.

Kevin Schmidt, Principal Developer

Kevin Schmidt decided to work at OpenEye when he saw Anthony drove a better car than he did. Prior to that moment of enlightenment he had worked in several real companies, including NASA-Ames and the ill-fated Ars Digita. He's a graduate of MIT and his last job involved writing the sound subsystem for the video game "Spiderman." In other words: he's a real programmer, unlike some of us.

Vincent Vivien, Director of European Accounts

Vincent came to us in a rather non-traditional way. After many years of rigorous study at a Shaolin temple in the Henan province in China, he wandered the highways and byways of European pharma and biotech, dispersing wisdom and sales quotes. Then, quite by chance, he came across rumor of the fabled OpenEye Way, a secret technique for convincing customers to buy software without conflict or anger, as exemplified by its founder. After passing many rigorous and exacting tests, such as eating at Horseman's Haven without complaining, he was inducted into the company in 2006 and has applied his newly refined skills with great vigor and success in our European office in Strasbourg, France. In particular, he organizes EuroCUP each year to great acclaim and shepherds application scientists around Europe, forcing them to sample expensive food and drink rare wines. Or at least that is what they claim. Oh, and he drives a 'very nice' car and claims he was once a medicinal chemist.

(Actually, he joined us in a very traditional way- he previously worked at BioReason. The rest is pretty accurate)

Gregory L. Warren, Ph.D., Senior Applications Scientist

Greg started work making brooms and tending honey bees. After one too many stings, he decided to try degrees in Chemistry and Biology from Walla Walla College (don't laugh). After graduation, and lacking employability, he decided to go to graduate school at MIT but was unable to decide on a course of study (note the pattern developing?). So he did protein crystallography, solution and solid-state NMR in the labs of Greg Petsko and Bob Griffin. In his spare time he played the French horn for beer money. (No really.) Following an "extended" post-doc in Brünger lab at Yale, he got his first job where he didn't have to panhandle, i.e., as a computational chemist at SmithKline Beecham later, unfortunately, to become GlaxoSmithKline. Tired of the incessant demands for monthly reports, he left in 2006 to join the hive-mind where he has the dubious honor of doubling OpenEye's pharmaceutical experience but once again gets stung a lot. There's a moral here somewhere.

Stanislaw Wlodek, Ph.D., Senior Scientist

Stan Wlodek received his Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the University of Warsaw. He spent several years in Canada as a post-doc and then went south to the University of Houston where he worked with Andy MacCammon. He moved to Santa Fe in 1998. In the fall of 2001, Stan started working as a consultant with OpenEye, implementing the AM1-BCC charging method of Chris Bayly. He decided against taking the coaching job for Poland in the 2002 World Cup, which can be directly related to Poland's lethargic performance, and joined OpenEye. Notwithstanding on how well Poland does in the 2010 competition, we anticipate Stan remaining at OpenEye and continuing his work on Szybki (he made us name it that) and Afitt (our bad).

Mike Word, Ph.D., Senior Scientist

Apocryphal story but true- after first talking to Mike for 15 minutes I asked him why he hadn't been working for OpenEye for years. He looked suitably embarrassed and we still haven't had a good answer from him. Mike had worked at SmithKline and then at GSK and for the Richardson's at Duke before coming to Santa Fe. He likes astronomy, movies and knows more about proteins than the rest of us combined. Proteins, you know, those big clumpy things drugs bind to. So he's helping overcome our biases, bringing some fresh perspectives on what we can do with our toolkits and enjoying the wonders of New Mexico. About time.