Catherine Hodges – Deputy Editor – RSC Medicinal Chemistry Blog

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Announcing the 2021 RSC Medicinal Chemistry Emerging Investigator Lectureship winner

19 Mar 2021

Dr Jacob Bush

Congratulations to Dr Jacob Bush, recipient of the 2021 RSC Medicinal Chemistry Emerging Investigator Lectureship.

The Lectureship was open to any candidate who received their PhD in 2011 or later and has made a significant contribution to medicinal chemistry in their early career. The RSC Medicinal Chemistry Editorial Board selected Dr. Bush, from GSK, from a short-list of nominees.

Many congratulations to Dr. Bush for winning the lectureship.

When he was informed of his selection, Dr. Bush said:

“It’s a privilege to receive this lectureship as it recognises cutting edge work in chemical biology by a team of outstanding scientists both at GSK and at our academic partner institutions. Building these innovative technologies for agile target validation is key to GSK’s differentiated approach to identify, select and develop more genetically validated targets which have higher likelihood of success.”

About Dr Bush:

Dr Jacob Bush works in medicinal chemistry & chemical biology at GSK, leading the development of new technologies to accelerate drug discovery, in particular through innovations in chemical biology and artificial intelligence (AI). He works between GSK, where he is group leader in the chemical biology department and The Francis Crick Institute, where he is an active member of the leadership team of the GSK-Crick LinkLabs collaboration.

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The BMCS Hall of Fame & Medal

18 Feb 2021

The RSC Interest Group for the Biological and Medicinal Chemistry Sector has a number of awards, events and grants supporting the medicinal chemistry community. Here, we will introduce just one of the ways the BMCS celebrates outsanding science in our field.

The BMCS Hall of Fame and Medal

The Hall of Fame and Medal is Individual award which recognizes prominent chemists for outstanding, sustained, contributions to any area of interest to the RSC Biological and Medicinal Chemistry Sector (BMCS), e.g. medicinal chemistry, agriscience, biooorganic chemistry and chemical biology, including teaching excellence, outstanding contributions to the BMCS, or any combination thereof.

Previous Hall of Fame inductees include Professor C Robin Ganellin (2018) and Sir Simon Campbell CBE (2019)

2018 & 2019 BMCS Hall of Fame inductees Professor C Robin Ganellin (2018) and Sir Simon Campbell CBE (2019)

Left: Prof. C Robin Ganellin receives his medal in 2018. Right: Sir Simon Campbell CBE, 2019 BMCS Hall of Fame inductee.

Introducing David Rees, PhD, FRSC, FMedSci, the 2020 Hall of Fame Inductee

In 2020, RSC Medicinal Chemistry Advisory Board member Dr David Rees was chosen to be inducted in the Hall of Fame.

David is the Chief Scientific Officer at Astex Pharmaceuticals, and is a figure recognized internationally for his innovative use of chemistry in drug discovery. He has led collaborations resulting in the discovery of three launched drugs, the anaesthetic agent Sugammadex which has been used in over 30 million patients in 60 countries, and the anti-cancer agents Ribociclib and Erdafitinib, both predicted to achieve blockbuster status. David is well known for his calm authority, scientific rigor and enthusiasm. To find out more about some of his research, see his recent Open Access RSC Medicinal Chemistry Review article (Fragment-based drug discovery: opportunities for organic synthesis)

David Rees will be presented with his Medal and Certificate at the 21^st RSC / SCI Medicinal Chemistry Symposium, delivering a presentation entitled “Medicines for Millions”.

Dr David Rees, 2020 Hall of Fame inductee

Have an outstanding chemist in mind who you feel should be in the Hall of Fame?

Submit your nomination for the 2021 inductee from 1st March 2021. Independent nominations may be submitted by e-mail to the BMCS Conference Secretariat outlining the justification and including the nominee’s CV and publication list. Additional independent letters of support to reinforce the nomination are strongly encouraged.

Nominees should be resident in the UK or continental Europe, or have spent a considerable proportion of their career there. There is no requirement to be an RSC or BMCS member. There are no age restrictions, and nominees may have an academic or industrial background.

To find out more about the activities of the BMCS, please see their webpage

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Introducing RSC Medicinal Chemistry Editorial Board member Jean-Louis Reymond

01 Apr 2020

Professor Jean-Louis Reymond

We are delighted to announce that Professor Jean-Louis Reymond has joined the RSC Medicinal Chemistry Editorial Board.

Jean-Louis Reymond studied Chemistry and Biochemistry at ETH Zürich, Switzerland and obtained his Ph.D. at the University of Lausanne on natural products synthesis (1989). After a Post-Doc and Assistant Professorship at the Scripps Research Institute, USA, he joined the University of Bern, Switzerland (1997).

His research focuses on the enumeration and visualization of chemical space for small molecule drug discovery, the synthesis of new molecules from the Generated DataBase (GDB, http://gdb.unibe.ch), and the design and synthesis of peptide dendrimers and polycyclic peptides as antimicrobials and for nucleic acids delivery.

He is the author of more than 300 scientific publications and reviews. See a selection of his recent RSC publications below:

An antimicrobial bicyclic peptide from chemical space against multidrug resistant Gram-negative bacteria

Chem. Commun., 2018,54, 5130-5133

Datasets and their influence on the development of computer assisted synthesis planning tools in the pharmaceutical domain

Chem. Sci., 2020,11, 154-168 (Open Access)

Design, crystal structure and atomic force microscopy study of thioether ligated d,l-cyclic antimicrobial peptides against multidrug resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Chem. Sci., 2017,8, 7464-7475 (Open Access)

Cytotoxic peptide conjugates of dinuclear areneruthenium trithiolato complexes

Med. Chem. Commun., 2015,6, 347-350

You can find out more about the full Editorial Board on our webpage.

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Nominations for the 2020 RSC Medicinal Chemistry Emerging Investigator Lectureship are now open!

20 Nov 2019

The 2020 RSC Medicinal Chemistry Emerging Investigator Lectureship is now open for nominations. The Lectureship celebrates early career researchers who have made significant contributions in the fields of medicinal chemistry and drug discovery.

Nominations will close 31 January 2020.

The recipient of the lectureship will receive a contribution of up to £1000 towards speaking at a conference in 2020.

Qualification
The lectureship is open to candidates who received their PhD in 2010 or later and who have made a significant contribution to medicinal chemistry in their early career, particularly if they have brought new ideas to drug discovery.

How you can nominate
If you would like to nominate someone please email us (medchem-rsc@rsc.org) with the following details:

Their name
Their affiliation
At least one paragraph explaining their achievements and why you think they should be considered

Additional supporting information, for example their CV, is very helpful in making a decision but is not mandatory for making a nomination.

Self-nominations are accepted but must be supported by a letter of support from your Head of Departments or similar person at your institute.

Selection
All qualified nominations will be considered and a short-list of candidates with be selected based on the information provided at nomination. The RSC Medicinal Chemistry Editorial Board will then vote to select the recipient and the winner will be announced in spring 2020.

Past winners of the RSC Medicinal Chemistry Emerging Investigator Lectureship (previously named the MedChemComm Emerging Investigator Lectureship) include:

Dr. Amanda Hargrove (Duke University, USA) – 2019
Dr. Gonçalo Bernardes (University of Cambridge, UK) – 2018
Dr Laura H. Heitman (Leiden University, Netherlands) – 2017
Dr Alessio Ciulli (University of Dundee, UK) – 2016
Professor Richard Payne (University of Sydney, Australia) – 2015
Professor Christian Heinis (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland) – 2013
Professor Patrick Gunning (University of Toronto, Canada) – 2012

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Introducing MedChemComm Associate Editor Sally-Ann Poulsen

21 May 2019

Professor Sally-Ann Poulsen

We are delighted to welcome to the team Professor Sally-Ann Poulsen, new MedChemComm Associate Editor.

Professor Poulsen’s research focuses on the development of new chemical probes, medicinal chemistry targeting cancer and infectious disease, and on fragment screening using native state mass spectrometry. You can find out more on her webpage.

Sally-Ann received her PhD in Medicinal Chemistry from Griffith University, before undertaking a Royal Society & National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Howard Florey Research Fellowship at the University of Cambridge. On returning to Australia, she was awarded an Australian Research Council QEII Fellowship, followed by an Australian Research Council Future Fellowship, and is now Professor of Chemical Biology and acting Deputy Director at Griffith Institute for Drug Discovery (GRIDD), Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia.

Professor Poulsen is also a Fellow of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute (RACI) (2017), Chair elect of the RACI Medicinal Chemistry and Chemical Biology Division and is a global council member of the International Chemical Biology Society.

Upon joining the MedChemComm team, Poulsen commented,

“I value research integrity and am truly excited to have an opportunity to help MedChemComm to share the wonderful science that is generated by the global medicinal chemistry community.”

Submit your research to Sally-Ann now!

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Medicinal Chemistry Residential School 2019

15 Apr 2019

The Royal Society of Chemistry Medicinal Chemistry Residential School is designed for graduate and post-doctoral chemists and will take place at Loughborough University from 2-7 June 2019.

Register now!

The meeting will cover topics of interest to drug discovery researchers, helping to increase understanding of the factors governing modern drug discovery from the initial concept through to translational science and intellectual property. Established since 1981, our Residential School has trained many of the world’s leading medicinal chemists working in the pharmaceutical industry and academic research institutes.

Examples of feedback from previous Residential School Delegates:

“It was an extremely worthwhile experience that greatly clarified a haze of vague knowledge, as well as taught me things I’ve never thought about before.”

“Great range of topics with a good balance of lectures and tutorials. I really enjoyed the week and definitely feel that I have learnt a lot. Would recommend to everyone.”

If you are interested in the event find out more information and register here.

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2019 MedChemComm Emerging Investigator Lectureship Winner

14 Mar 2019

Congratulations to Professor Amanda Hargrove from Duke University, USA, the recipient of the 2019 MedChemComm Emerging Investigator Lectureship!

The Lectureship was open to any candidate who received their PhD in 2009 or later and have made a significant contribution to medicinal chemistry in their early career. The MedChemComm Editorial Board then voted on a short-list of nominations.

Many congratulations to Prof. Hargrove for winning the lectureship.

About Amanda

Amanda E. Hargrove, Ph.D. joined the faculty at Duke University in 2013 as an Assistant Professor of Chemistry following an NIH postdoctoral fellowship with Professor Peter B. Dervan at the California Institute of Technology and doctoral research at the University of Texas at Austin with Professors Eric V. Anslyn and Jonathan L. Sessler. Her research group at Duke focuses on developing small molecule probes to investigate the structure and function of RNA molecules relevant to human disease. You can find out more about their research by visiting the laboratory webpage.

Prof. Hargrove holds a secondary appointment in the Biochemistry Department and membership in the Duke Cancer Institute, Duke Cellular and Molecular Biology Program, and the Center for Biological and Tissue Engineering. Her recent honors include the ChemComm Emerging Investigator Lectureship, NSF CAREER Award, Cottrell Scholar Award, and the Prostate Cancer Young Investigator Award.

For a selection of her excellent research, please see some of Prof. Hargrove’s recent works below.

Fluorescent peptide displacement as a general assay for screening small molecule libraries against RNA

Org. Biomol. Chem., 2019, 17, 1778-1786

Part of the themed collection: New Talent

Sensing the impact of environment on small molecule differentiation of RNA sequences

Chem. Commun., 2017, 53, 13363-13366

Part of the themed collection: Chemosensors and Molecular Logic

Amiloride as a new RNA-binding scaffold with activity against HIV-1 TAR

Med. Chem. Commun., 2017,8, 1022-1036

Part of the themed collection: 2017 Hot Articles in MedChemComm

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MedChemComm welcomes Professor Jayanta Haldar to the Editorial Board

07 Sep 2018

We are delighted to welcome to the team Professor Jayanta Haldar of the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR), Bangalore, India.

Jayanta studied at Presidency College, University of Calcutta before moving to the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore for an M.Sc. and Ph.D.. In 2004, he took up a postdoctoral position at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA with Alexander Klibanov. Subsequently, Jayanta returned to India to take up an Assistant Professor position at JNCASR, his current faculty, where he was made Associate Professor in 2015.

Professor Haldar’s group specializes in the development of novel antimicrobial therapeutics, coatings and surfaces, alongside novel nano-delivery systems for drugs. To find out more about his research, take a look at the group webpage, or read a few of his many publications:

Selectively targeting bacteria by tuning the molecular design of membrane-active peptidomimetic amphiphiles

Chem. Commun., 2018,54, 4943-4946, DOI: 10.1039/C8CC01926F

L-Lysine based lipidated biphenyls as agents with anti-biofilm and anti-inflammatory properties that also inhibit intracellular bacteria

Chem. Commun., 2017,53, 8427-8430, DOI: 10.1039/C7CC04206J

A review on cell wall synthesis inhibitors with an emphasis on glycopeptide antibiotics

Med. Chem. Commun., 2017,8, 516-533, DOI: 10.1039/C6MD00585C

Aryl-alkyl-lysines: small molecular membrane-active antiplasmodial agents

Med. Chem. Commun., 2017,8, 434-439, DOI: 10.1039/C6MD00589F

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Introducing new MedChemComm Editor-in-Chief, Professor Gerhard Ecker

14 May 2018

MedChemComm is very excited to welcome to the team our new Editor-in-Chief, Professor Gerhard Ecker. Prof. Ecker is the current head of the Pharmacoinformatics Research Group in the Department of Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Vienna. His research interests include ligand- and structure-based drug design, focusing on transmembrane transport proteins and the prediction of on- and off-kinetics, as well as semantic data integration.

He completed his PhD at the University of Vienna under the supervision of Professor Fleischhacker and Professor Noe before taking a post-doctoral position with Professor Seydel’s group in Borstel, Germany.

Gerhard has previously held positions as President of the European Federation for Medicinal Chemistry and vice-president of the Austrian Pharmaceutical Society.

He has published over 100 full papers, including:

Probing the stereoselectivity of P-glycoprotein-synthesis, biological activity and ligand docking studies of a set of enantiopure benzopyrano[3,4-b][1,4]oxazines
Chem. Commun., 2011, 47, 2586-2588

Open PHACTS computational protocols for in silico target validation of cellular phenotypic screens: knowing the knowns
Med. Chem. Commun., 2016, 7, 1237-1244

From linked open data to molecular interaction: studying selectivity trends for ligands of the human serotonin and dopamine transporter
Med. Chem. Commun., 2016, 7, 1819-1831

For more information, visit his lab group website.

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RSC Medicinal Chemistry Blog