Chemistry: still thinking small molecule

摘要

The emergence of genomics has had a wide-ranging effect on the pharmaceutical business. It has helped to increase the types of targets available to drug discovery teams and has started to add new biologic drugs to the present armamentarium of small-molecule drugs at the same time as the number of traditional drugs in pharmas' pipelines is decreasing. However, those changes have had little effect on pharmaceutical companies' need for those scientists who have always occupied the central positions in the industry: chemists in general, and synthetic organic chemists in particular. "When fewer and fewer drugs are coming out of natural products, synthetic organic chemists are even more vital," says Mark Goulet, executive director of chemistry at Merck Research Laboratories. Recognizing the changes brought about by genomics, laboratory managers now expect their chemists to show the ability to think beyond the chemical box. The nature of modern drug discovery and development requires them to work in multidisciplinary teams -a requirement that often leads recruiters to focus on individuals with some industrial experience. "We work in a multidisciplinary, team-oriented environment," says Eric Sjogren, vice president of chemistry for Roche Palo Alto. "The best medicinal chemists are those interested in learning fields beyond synthetic organic chemistry and able to incorporate an understanding of other fields into their drug discovery efforts."