Our science seminars are back. Join us online as we welcome Dr Allan Jordan, Director of Oncology Drug Discovery at Sygnature Discovery.
This seminar will be delivered via Zoom. Details will be sent nearer the time.
Seminar synopsis:
It’s been over eight decades since the first use of cytotoxic drugs in cancer therapy, and almost fifty years since the first targeted therapeutic agent. And in that time, survival rates have improved dramatically. But is it really that clear-cut? This talk will offer a personal perspective on the impact of some of our novel therapeutics, and suggest some potential future opportunities to further enhance patient benefit.
About Dr Allan Jordan:
Allan joined Sygnature Discovery in February 2019 as Director of Oncology Drug Discovery. His role includes scientific oversight of the oncology projects within Sygnature and the strategic development and enhancement of capabilities and expertise in oncology. This remit spans all scientific disciplines from target validation and hit finding through to pre-clinical development. He has over 23 years of medicinal chemistry and drug discovery experience with an established track record of delivering compounds to clinical trials across a variety of therapeutic areas.
Allan started his career as a medicinal chemist at RiboTargets (now Vernalis). After ten years in the lab, he joined Cancer Research UK (CRUK) as Head of Chemistry in the Manchester Institute Drug Discovery Unit. During his 9-year tenure, he led both internal research activities and national and international research collaborations to deliver novel oncology therapeutics, alongside his responsibilities for synthetic and medicinal chemistry, computational chemistry, informatics and structural biology. He was also passionately involved in science communication and research engagement through both direct contact and the broadcast media, engaging in face to face interactions with more than twenty thousand of the charity’s supporters. In 2016 he was a recipient of a CRUK “Flame of Hope” award (the charity’s highest award for voluntary services) for his contributions to research engagement on behalf of the charity.
Allan has a BSc (Hons.) in Chemistry and a PhD in organic and medicinal chemistry from the University of Manchester and undertook post-doctoral research at the University of Reading.
