Westley hails from Dallas, Texas. After graduating from high school, he volunteered to serve in the United States Army. He held various positions from infantry medic to clinical manager. As an undergraduate, he spent time as a research assistant working on lipopeptide synthesis, medicinal chemistry, and photochemistry. His work in graduate school was focused on heterocycle synthesis, organotransition metal chemistry, and teaching various undergraduate chemistry laboratory courses. He also spent time as a formulation chemist for a Colorado CBD company. Westley co-founded Colorado Chromatography Labs and joined as their Chief Science Officer in the spring of 2020. After screening various compounds against cancer cell lines, we had two hits that had solid IC-50 values. The team spun off BlackStone Therapeutics and set out to complete the preclinical studies needed to apply to bring our scaffolds to Phase 1 Clinical Trials. After successful in vitro safety studies, MTT assay, and PKPD, our team applied for the Phase 1 Small Business Innovation and Research Grant in September 2022 and is awaiting impact score and results. Our group is heading to in vivo efficacy models, mechanism of action, and metabolite studies. This data will be utilized in our application for the Phase 2 Small Business Innovation and Research Grant early 2023.