Quotes from earlier Attendees

«Modern medicinal chemistry is a highly cross-disciplined activity requiring an appreciation of diverse scientific disciplines ranging from genetics to process engineering. The Leysin courses provide focused contemporary training. Students and young medchems from industry have the opportunity to meet and learn from world experts and drug discoverers in an informal setting and to test their knowledge in worked tutorials.»
Tony Wood, Senior Vice President Medicinal Chemistry, Pfizer

«The scientific environment and location were excellent. Overall I was impressed with the breadth of education that was provided by the course as well as the colored handouts for all the presentations. All lectures were of the highest quality by experts in their respective fields. There was also sufficient time for the students and instructors to interact. I personally made a number of new or renewed past relationships and found the overall meeting intellectually stimulating. … I definitely would recommend this course to medicinal chemists that are looking for a broader prospective for their skills in drug discovery.»
Dave Swinney, CEO, iRND3, Institute for Rare and Neglected Diseases drug discovery

«The 10th Course on Medicinal Chemistry in Leysin, Switzerland is highly focused on medicinal chemistry and those chemistry related disciplines that are required in medicinal chemistry. The focus is very chemo-centric which I found refreshing with little specialized biology detail. In this respect, this is the best medicinal chemistry course I have attended in the last two decades. This course is aimed to increase mid to upper level in medicinal chemistry expertise. It is not primarily an introductory course, nor is it a course for a medicinal chemist seeking information in a highly specialized therapeutic area. Attendees ranged from some graduate students to highly experienced (the speakers), but the majority of attendees seemed in the 5-10 years experience range. Mostly attendees were European with some attendees from Asia. The course infrastructure, facilities and locale were superb and as an American fully conformed with my expectations of Swiss culture.»
Chris Lipinski, Scientific Advisor at Melior Discovery

«The 10th Swiss Medicinal Chemistry Course provided an outstanding and unique opportunity for newcomers to drug discovery to be introduced to the multiparametric art of medicinal chemistry and its allied fields. In an intense week of lectures and more informal interactions, students received a remarkably comprehensive cornucopia of information on such diverse topics as fragment-based screening, structure-guided design, privileged scaffolds, target-class chemistry, ADMET/DMPK, kinetic analysis of drug-target interactions, and much more. These varied topics were presented by the leading experts in their respective fields, in an atmosphere that facilitated casual exchange between the lecturers and students. I only wish that this course had been available to me in the early days of my own career.»
Robert Copeland, Chief Scientific Officer, Epizyme, Inc.

«The 10th Swiss Course on Medicinal Chemistry in Leysin has been the best yet, clearly making it the ‘must-attend’ medicinal chemistry course in Europe. The breadth of the scientific program assembled by the scientific committee includes leading figures from both industrial and academic laboratories, including case histories, detailed coverage of key medicinal chemistry concepts alongside insights into the future direction of the field. This year the program included more speakers and attendees from North America highlighting the global appeal of the format which the course organizers have developed. With most presenters choosing to stay for the whole of the meeting, the chance to chat with key opinion leaders over an early afternoon walk or a course dinner provides everyone with the chance to understand where the next breakthroughs in medicinal chemistry will be. The warmth of the welcome in Leysin and strong focus on learning creates an atmosphere that all participants recognize as unique to this course. The scientific program has benefited from the hard work of the organizing committee in selecting the best speakers coupled with listening to the feedback from previous courses. The result is a program that covers all key aspects of medicinal chemistry, providing insights to the most experience chemists and newcomer alike.»
Dr. Andrew Mortlock, Vice President for Oncology Projects, AstraZeneca