Lawrence Sheringham Borquaye is an alumni of St. Mary’s Seminary Senior High School (SMASCO), Lolobi – VR, Ghana where he graduated in 2000. He received his B. Sc. in Chemistry from the University of Cape Coast, Ghana in 2006, working with Dr. Victor Y. Atsu - Barko in investigating the mosquito repellency properties of the leaves of Hyptis suaveleons. He proceeded to the University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA and graduated in 2013 with a Ph.D. in Chemistry working under the mentorship of Professor Nathan A. Schnarr in developing new tools for engineering polyketide synthases (PKSs), the gigantic biosynthetic machinery responsible for the assembly of the class of natural product called polyketides. This work was partly supported by the UMASS Amherst Chemistry-Biology Interface Trainee Fellowship. After graduate studies, Lawrence came back to Ghana and joined the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Kumasi where he is a lecturer in the Department of Chemistry. He also doubles as the Assistant Laboratory Manager of the KNUST Central Laboratory, a state-of-the-art research facility that is home to modern analytical instruments for research in the basic and applied sciences. The research works of Lawrence Sheringham Borquaye has been funded by research grants from the International Foundation for Science and the Building Stronger Universities II (BSU II) project which is a DANIDA funded program between KNUST and some Danish universities.

Lawrence is interdisciplinary in nature, and is interested in phenomena that occurs at the interface of chemistry and biology. His research areas cuts across Natural Products, Environmental Chemistry and Microbiology. He believes that nature has solutions to all the current challenges plaguing mankind, “we just have to dig a little deeper”.

BSU II Bioresources Pilot Grant, KNUST – DANIDA (Principal Investigator)  2015

BSU II Climate Smart Agriculture Pilot Grant, KNUST – DANIDA (Co-Investigator) 2015

BSU II WP3 (Health Delivery System) Pilot Grant, KNUST – DANIDA (Co-Investigator)

International Foundation for Science Collaborative Research Grant (Principal Investigator) 2015

UMASS Amherst Chemistry Biology Interface Trainee Fellowship  2009 – 2010