Lee J. Silverberg attended college at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. He graduated in 1986 with a B.S. degree in Chemistry with a minor in Journalism. He was also a 4-year member of the Rowing team, where he earned a varsity letter and was part of a boat that won the school’s first medal ever at the Dad Vail Regatta.
He continued his studies at the University of Delaware, earning a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry in 1991. While at Delaware, he taught chemistry laboratory classes for 10 semesters and carried out research with two graduate advisors.
From 1987-1989, he trained with 2010 Nobel Prize Winner Prof. Richard F. Heck (https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2010/heck/biographical/) studying the palladium-catalyzed reactions of alkynes with aryl halides and vinyl bromides.
Upon Prof. Heck’s retirement, he joined the group of Prof. Douglass F. Taber, where from 1989-1991 he studied ruthenium-catalyzed asymmetric hydrogenation and completed a total synthesis of (+)-Brefeldin A.
After graduation, he began a career as a pharmaceutical process research and development chemist at Bristol-Myers Squibb. He spent a total of nearly 18 years in the pharmaceutical industry, also later working for Johnson Matthey and Merck. Among his accomplishments were the invention and scale up of new syntheses of anticancer drugs etoposide and etoposide phosphate and anti-emetic Δ9-tetrahydrocannibinol. During the course of his career he also successfully developed processes for many other molecules, including ifetroban, various platinum coordination compounds used as anticancer agents, amphetamines, opiates, and other cannabinoids.
In 2009, Dr. Silverberg returned to teaching, first as an adjunct professor at Camden County College in New Jersey, and then as an Instructor at Penn State’s Schuylkill campus. In the fall of 2010, he became a tenure-track Assistant Professor at Penn State Schuylkill. He was granted tenure in 2016 and promoted to Associate Professor. In 2022, he was promoted to full Professor.
He has continued rowing since his days at GWU, and is a member of Fairmount Rowing Association on Boathouse Row in Philadelphia. He also has coached at the Philadelphia Girls’ Rowing Club.
Outside of work he enjoys spending time with his wife, two daughters, one dog and one cat.