Author Archive

Tools and Strategies to Find Chemical Probes for Your Protein – The Role of Computer-Aided Drug Discovery

You are invited to attend a joint Biochemical Society/Royal Society of Chemistry Workshop entitled Tools and Strategies to Find Chemical Probes for Your Protein – The Role of Computer-Aided Drug Discovery.

15 November 2013
Charles Darwin House, London, WC1N 2JU, UK

Application and Abstract deadline: 16 September 2013

This workshop aims to bring together biological scientists and computational chemists to discuss research challenges and facilitate collaborations. The workshop will be of particular interest to biological scientists who require new chemical reagents to help them to better understand biological mechanisms and to computational chemists who wish to apply computational ligand discovery methods to a biological problem. Please feel free to pass this message onto colleagues at your institution who may have interest in attending the workshop. The programme will feature oral presentations, flash poster presentations and discussion sessions. There will also be plenty of networking opportunities dispersed throughout the day.

Speakers and Facilitators:

  • Pedro Ballister, European Bioinformatics Institute, Cambridge, UK
  • Chas Bountra, University of Oxford, UK 
  • Ruth Brenk, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany
  • David Brown, University of Kent, UK  
  • Grant Churchill, University of Oxford, UK
  • John Irwin, University of California, USA
  • Paul Hawkins OpenEye Scientific Software, UK
  • Taufiq Rahman, University of Cambridge, UK
  • Dahlia Weiss, Heptares Therapeutics UK 

Organising Committee

  • Grant Churchill, University of Oxford, UK
  • Taufiq Rahman, University of Cambridge, UK
  • John Irwin, University of California, USA
  • David Brown, University of Kent, UK

Attendance is by application only and will be FREE of charge for Biochemical Society and Royal Society of Chemistry members. Delegates are encouraged to submit poster abstracts for flash and poster presentation. This workshop is the fourth of a series entitled “Analytical Tools for the Life Sciences”, a collaborative project between the Biochemical Society and Royal Society of Chemistry.

For more information please visit the event webpage.

Don’t miss out! Application and Abstract deadline is the 16 September 2013.

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MedChemComm papers in 2013 Cancer Nanotechnology collection

We are pleased to present a web collection of articles from publications across the RSC journal portfolio demonstrating the use of (nano)technology in the diagnosis, imaging and treatment of cancer.

Here are some Med Chem Comm articles in this special cancer nanotechnology collection:

Towards biocompatible nanovalves based on mesoporous silica nanoparticles
Ying-Wei Yang
Med. Chem. Commun., 2011,2, 1033-1049
DOI: 10.1039/C1MD00158B

Silver nanoparticles—the real “silver bullet” in clinical medicine?
Kenneth K. Y. Wong and Xuelai Liu
Med. Chem. Commun., 2010,1, 125-131
DOI: 10.1039/C0MD00069H

Engineering of peglayted camptothecin into core–shell nanomicelles for improving solubility, stability and combination delivery
Haiqing Dong, Chunyan Dong, Yue Feng, Tianbin Ren, Zhonghai Zhang, Lan Li and Yongyong Li  
Med. Chem. Commun., 2012,3, 1555-1561
DOI: 10.1039/C2MD20153D

Hard shell gas-filled contrast enhancement particles for colour Doppler ultrasound imaging of tumors
H. Paul Martinez, Yuko Kono, Sarah L. Blair, Sergio Sandoval, Jessica Wang-Rodriguez, Robert F. Mattrey, Andrew C. Kummel and William C. Trogler
Med. Chem. Commun., 2010,1, 266-270
DOI: 10.1039/C0MD00139B

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Poster Session at the 2013 Medicinal Chemistry Residential School

Sunday night saw the inaugural poster session at the 2013 RSC Medicinal Chemistry Summer School. In total 16 delegates presentPoster Session at the 2013 Medicinal Chemistry Residential Schooled their work on the evening. A broad spectrum of chemistry was discussed over a glass of wine and posters provided a great way to see the research interests of delegates. There were 2 poster prizes up for grabs – a 1 year subscription to MedChemComm  and a book from the RSC Books Drug Discovery Series.
On Monday morning, Andy Davis announced the winners; there was a tie for the MedChemComm sponsored Prize which was shared between:

  • Louis Allot ( University of Hull) for his work on PET imaging of nuclear receptor expression.
  • Kate Nicholson (University of Hull) for her work on synthesis and evaluation of novel coordination complexes as CXCR4 antagonists.

 Poster Session at 2013 Medicinal Chemistry Residential School

Delegates also had an opportunity to vote for their favourite poster, the winner of the “participants prize” went to Madura Jayatunga (University of Oxford) for his work on non-covalent and covalent inhibitors of the HIF1a-p300 interaction. Madura received the RSC Book PrizeNew Therapeutic Strategies for Type 2 Diabetes.

Thanks to our 2 judges Andy Davis and Roger Griffin; and of course everyone that took part!

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Chemistry skills for drug discovery

Chemistry expertise is critical to technical success across the spectrum of innovative medicines R&D. This position paper describes the changes that have taken place in the drug discovery sector and the challenges this presents in terms of ensuring chemistry, as the key enabling science, continues to deliver the essential translation of biological opportunity into clinical application.

It includes:

  • Impact of recent developments on training capacity and mobility
  • Key skills and capabilities for drug discovery chemists 

RSC-science-Drug discovery position paper

Read the full position paper by David Fox at RSC Science

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HOT: A critical assessment of modeling safety-related drug attrition

In this HOT perspective, Hasselgreen and co-workers at AstraZeneca R&D Mölndal, reflect on the tough crisis that has afflicted the pharmaceutical industry in recent years, where the increased R&D budgets have not translated into new valuable products. This review offers an excellent overview of aspects and practicalities involved in preclinical toxicity prediction and analysis. The authors inspect commonly used guidelines/rules in medicinal chemistry aimed at reducing toxicity wondering if a simple distinction between compounds that have safety liabilities and “clean” compounds really exists. And crucially, they reflect on the impact of applying such guidelines on compounds progressing to clinical phases or even further and becoming approved drugs.

A critical assessment of modeling safety-related drug attrition

A critical assessment of modeling safety-related drug attrition
Daniel Muthas, Scott Boyer and Catrin Hasselgren
DOI: 10.1039/C3MD00072A

Free to access for 4 weeks

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‘Realising Lead-Oriented Synthesis’ wins the latest MedChemComm poster prize

Congratulations to Daniel Foley and Dr Richard Doveston who were awarded the poster prize at the RSC-BMCS Fragment-based Drug Discovery meeting, held at the STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in Oxfordshire, 3rd-5th March 2013.

Daniel is a PhD research student working under the supervision of Profs. Adam Nelson and Stephen Marsden at the University of Leeds, while Richard took up a post-doctoral research position with Prof. Adam Nelson and Prof. Steve Marsden, in collaboration with GlaxoSmithKline in April 2012. Their poster entitled ‘Realising Lead-Oriented Synthesis’ won the competition. Daniel receives a one-year personal subscription to MedChemComm.

Fragments2013_‘Realising Lead-Oriented Synthesis’

Dr Richard Doveston and Daniel Foley, University of Leeds

Photo provided by the University of Leeds.

Also read the news item featured on the University of Leeds, School of Chemistry homepage.

Congratulations again to Richard and Daniel on their award! The MedChemComm team wishes them all the very best with their future research work.

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Methanocarba ring as a ribose modification in ligands of G protein-coupled receptors on the cover of MedChemComm, Issue 4

Methanocarba ring as a ribose modification in ligands of G protein-coupled purine and pyrimidine receptors

Welcome to MedChemComm Issue 4, 2013!

Featuring on this month MedChemComm front cover is the work of Dilip K. Tosh and Kenneth A. Jacobson at the NIH in Bethesda, US:

Methanocarba ring as a ribose modification in ligands of G protein-coupled purine and pyrimidine receptors: synthetic approaches
Dilip K. Tosh and Kenneth A. Jacobson
DOI: 10.1039/c2md20348k

Free to access for 6 weeks 

This work had recenlty been highlighted on our blogs – why not read the full post here!

Also in this issue, read the review article on Metabolism-guided drug design by Amit S. Kalgutkar et al. at Pfizer Worldwide Research and Development, and much more!

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