Teaching the principles of medicinal chemistry to 3rd year Pharmacy students, covereing drug classes, drug discovery, SAR and aspects of the hit-to-lead optimisation process.

Supervision and development of ~30 chemists including 10 PhDs or equivalent. Goal setting, performance evaluation and all aspects of line management. Medicinal Chemistry Liaison with the Immunology, Infectious diseases and Ophthalmology Biology group – ensuring projects are optimally resourced within Medicinal Chemistry; responsible for the medicinal chemistry of Basel’s portfolio of Antibacterials (2 front runners with novel MoAs delivered in 2019). Medicinal Chemistry representative in strategic alliances to discover novel antibiotics through collaborations (Discuva (up to $190M) and WarpDriveBio-Ginkgo Bioworks (up to $390M)), defining medicinal chemistry lab objectives and member of the respective Joint Steering Committees. Evaluation of external assets and technologies. Training and mentoring in Medicinal Chemistry, Library Design, Data Analysis and Software.

Supervision and development of ~30 chemists including 10 PhDs or equivalent. Goal setting, performance evaluation and all aspects of line management. Medicinal Chemistry Liaison with the Infectious diseases group (Antibiotics, antivirals) ensuring projects are optimally resourced within Medicinal Chemistry. Key proponent for the implementation of novel software in medicinal chemistry. Training and mentoring.

Evaluation of Exploratory targets by providing proof of concept and confidence in safety by delivering tool compounds for early de-risking. Heavy emphasis on outsourcing for both synthesis and biological evaluation. Senior Principal Scientist (from 2008) in charge of 2 exploratory projects for the Pain therapeutic area; I am responsible for target assessment, HTS triage, lead selection, lead optimization and delivery of pharmacological tools (including HTS-enabling compounds such as fluorescent ligands). My work involves the analysis of large amounts of data, the design of quality libraries and singletons (using both internal and external resources), the prioritization of targets through early assessment of drug-like properties (e.g. ADME, selectivity, novelty) and the design of key biological experiments to assess confidence in rationale and confidence in safety for new mechanisms. I work with a multidisciplinary team and I communicate successfully with a broad range of key players (management, external contributors, colleagues and supervisees) to implement strategy and prioritize the work. I have recently gained useful insights in new technologies such as protein conjugates and activity-based protein probes. Strengths: Ability to rapidly assess emerging targets, triage large amounts of data, focus on quality leads, and creatively deliver enabling compounds (e.g. a new HTS-enabling ligand). Proactive user/designer of computational chemistry tools to analyze data and to design new quality compounds. Excellent communication skills, creative thinking and proactive use of in-silico models.

Pfizer (Sandwich, UK). Principal Scientist. As leader of a team of 2-3 chemists, I was responsible for the design, synthesis, and follow-up of compounds from leads to development candidates (one compound in Phase I, another entering Ph I), and worked in close interaction with colleagues from in-vitro and in-vivo pharmacology and DMPK. Strengths: ability to motivate a team of chemists; inclusive management style; high standards of productivity, leading by example; creativity in addressing problems, such as synthetic issues, “patent-busting” and lead modification. Comprehensive knowledge of toxicophores.Actively involved in the recruitment of candidates at the PhD level, and liaison with PhD students.In-house training of chemists (MS/BS/PhD level) by running on a regular basis workshops and problem sessions on organic synthesis, current drugs, library design and in-silico tools.Strengths: ability to motivate and train a diverse set of people.Designer/Beta tester/super user of several internal software packages (modeling, database, and library design). Responsible for the training of >20 colleagues in the use of library design software; I have also designed a specific lead follow-up tool for library design using Pipeline Pilot. Strengths: In depth understanding of colleague’s needs and questions. Ability to train and motivate colleagues e.g. wrote the first practical user’s manual on Library Design in 2003 for Pfizer Global Research and Development.

2001-2002: UCB Pharma (Belgium). Project Manager of a preclinical project. Coordination of the team effort of >15 researchers involved in different stages of drug discovery: combinatorial and medicinal chemistry, in-vitro and in-vivo pharmacology as well as early DMPK. Liaised with a group of researchers from a CRO (Biofocus). Strengths: Learned how to present project status to a Research board, have a snapshot view of the project’s status, and motivate a diverse, interdisciplinary team of scientists. 1998-2002: UCB Pharma (Belgium) Medicinal Chemistry Team Leader, responsible for a team of 2-3 chemists.