Sam is a Patent Executive in the James & Wells Patents team, based in our Christchurch office.

Sam has a PhD in Chemistry from the Australian National University and undertook post-doctoral research at Yonsei University in South Korea. Sam has a background in organic synthesis, biological chemistry, protein engineering and molecular biology. His PhD research included the synthesis of unsaturated aliphatic amino acids and their evaluation as bioisosteres of canonical amino acids during cell-free protein synthesis. His post-doctoral research involved evaluating new methods to improve hybridisation capture-based target enrichment for Next-Generation Sequencing, and work towards the development of a combinatorial peptide synthesis platform utilizing ink-jet printing.

Prior to joining James & Wells, Sam spent over two-and-a-half years working as a Patent Examiner for the Intellectual Property Office of New Zealand (IPONZ) covering subject matter including: antibody-drug conjugates, oligonucleotides, mammalian cell-differentiation methods, pharmaceuticals, agricultural and food compositions, chemical processes, and steel coatings.

Outside of work Sam enjoys spending time in the Mackenzie Region of New Zealand, hiking, bouldering, and fishing. In addition to having resided in Australia and South Korea, Sam has lived in the United Kingdom and China, and enjoys travel.