Stephen Frye's Biography

Stephen Frye, Director of The Center for Integrative Chemical Biology and Drug Discovery, University of North Carolina

Stephen Frye is a professor and director of the Center for Integrative Chemical Biology and Drug Discovery (CICBDD) at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. Frye is also the lead principal investigator for the North Carolina Comprehensive Chemical Biology Center, a UNC-based, NCI designated center that engages in oncology drug discovery. His research focuses on chemical biology of chromatin regulation and drug discovery to meet unmet needs in oncology.
After obtaining a BS in chemistry at North Carolina State University in 1983, Frye joined the laboratory of Professor Ernest Eliel at UNC-Chapel Hill. Frye's research at UNC focused on asymmetric synthesis and included an off-campus research fellowship in Lausanne, Switzerland, to investigate mechanisms of stereoselective organometallic reactions via NMR kinetics.
Upon completing his PhD in 1987, Frye began his professional career as a medicinal chemist at the newly initiated US research site for Glaxo, located at that time in temporary facilities in Venable Hall on the UNC campus. He subsequently led the project that resulted in Avodart, GlaxoSmithKline’s dual 5(alpha)-reductase inhibitor for treatment of benign prostatic hyperplasia.
Shortly after Glaxo merged with Wellcome in 1995, Frye established a new chemistry department in Research Triangle Park based upon kinase target class science and GSK’s kinase inhibitors, Tykerb (a dual erbB2/EGFR inhibitor approved for the treatment of metastatic breast cancer) and Pazopanib (approved for renal carcinoma) were discovered within this department. In 1999 he began a secondment at GW’s Stevenage site in the United Kingdom leading a research unit in medicinal chemistry. Following the merger with GSK in the spring of 2000, he was selected to lead GSK’s High Throughput Chemistry Group that evolved into Discovery Medicinal Chemistry (DMC).
Over the seven years Frye led DMC, the group grew to more than 200 chemists and developed global target-class chemical science and a compound collection strategy that enhanced both the productivity and quality of GSK’s hit and lead generation across all therapeutic areas. Frye left GSK to join the UNC School of Pharmacy in October 2007 to create the CICBDD in cooperation with the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, the School of Medicine, and the Department of Chemistry.