Brittany L. Hayes received her Ph.D. degree in Organic Chemistry from Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Her dissertation research focused on transition-metal mediated cycloaddition reactions. She conducted postdoctoral research at the University of Illinois at Chicago in the Department of Medicinal Chemistry and Pharmacognosy. As an American Heart Association Postdoctoral Fellow, she examined the design and synthesis of potential inhibitors of sickle cell hemoglobin polymerization. In addition, she helped to develop a new homogeneous assay that will combinatorially screen libraries of reactive isothiocyanate derivatives using electrospray mass spectrometry (ESMS).