The 145th Annual Meeting of the Pharmaceutical Society of Japan (Fukuoka)

Organizer: Takeshi Nanjo (Grad. Sch. Pharm. Sci., Kyoto Univ.), Kunihiko Morihiro (Grad. Sch. of Eng., The Univ. of Tokyo)

As potential breakthrough drugs for diseases that are difficult to treat with conventional pharmaceuticals, modalities based on mid-sized molecules such as nucleic acids and peptides have recently garnered significant attention. These mid-sized molecules combine the advantages of small-molecule drugs, which can be chemically synthesized, and biopharmaceuticals, which offer high target specificity. They are expected to play a central role in global drug discovery research in the future.
On the other hand, to fully unlock the potential of mid-sized molecule drugs, the application of chemical strategies is essential throughout all stages of drug discovery, including manufacturing, efficacy optimization, and toxicity reduction. Therefore, this symposium, titled “Frontiers of mid-size drug discovery research —chemical approach that accelerates mid-size drug discovery—” will feature four distinguished speakers who possess diverse chemical technologies expected to significantly advance mid-sized drug discovery. Their presentations will cover topics such as the development of synthetic methods for non-natural peptides utilizing N-halogenation (Nanjo), high-purity RNA production techniques leveraging hydrophobic purification tags (Inagaki), the design of anti-miR21 nucleic acids using non-cyclic artificial nucleotides (Kamiya), and drug discovery research employing mid-sized molecule assembly technologies (Morihiro). These talks will provide insights into cutting-edge next-generation chemical approaches.