David Withall

David is a biological / synthesis chemist with more than 10 years’ experience in biological chemistry, chemical biology and synthetic organic chemistry. He currently works in the Pest-Host Interaction team, developing ecologically inspired solutions for next generation pest management. David uses his expertise in synthetic organic chemistry to synthesis authentic standards of semiochemicals for characterisation and functional assays as well as developing sustainable methods for large scale production of semiochemicals for field trials.

David’s research also uses his chemical biology expertise to investigate fundamental roles of proteins in pest-host interactions, discovery of novel natural products that have potential agrochemical applications from microbiological sources and investigating their biosynthetic origins. David is also committed to exploring potential commercialisation opportunities from his research and, together with colleagues at Rothamsted Research, in 2020 he co-founded PheroSyn, a spin-out company, with the aim of exploiting outputs from the research group.