John Andraos earned a Ph.D. in 1992 from the University of Toronto in physical organic chemistry. He then did post-doctoral work at the University of Ottawa and at The University of Queensland studying kinetics of reactions in heterogeneous media and cumulene intermediates in low temperature matrices, respectively. Since his appointment as Lecturer and Course Director at York University (1999-2009) he has taught and developed courses in organic chemistry. In 2002 he launched the first industrial and "green" chemistry course in the history of the Department of Chemistry at York. His current research is broadly defined as reaction optimization and discovery. His undertaking of an ambitious project to construct a database of synthesis plans fully quantified by green metrics analysis for pharmaceuticals, important natural products, dyestuffs, agrichemicals, and molecules of theoretical interest culminated in the publication of "The Algebra of Organic Synthesis: green metrics, design strategy, route selection, and optimization" (CRC Press-Taylor & Francis, 2012). He also co-edited "Green Syntheses Volume 1" (CRC Press-Taylor & Francis, 2014) with Prof. Pietro Tundo (University of Venice) which is the first resource of reliable green chemistry experiments that have been checked for greenness claims by rigorous material efficiency metrics analysis.