The "Prous Institute-Overton and Meyer Award for New Technologies in Drug Discovery" was established to encourage innovation and investigation in technologies related to drug discovery. The Award is given biennially to acknowledge the discovery, evaluation or use of a new technology, and consists of a diploma, € 7.500 and an invitation to present a lecture at an EFMC-ISMC symposium.

Previous recipients were: Prof. V. Ley in 2008, Prof. D. Neri in 2006 and Prof. C.O. Kappe in 2004.

Prof. Steven V. Ley, Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom
Winner of the 2008 Prous Institute-Overton and Meyer Award for New Technologies in Drug Discovery

This award acknowledges Professor Ley commitment to the development, discovery, evaluation and use of new technologies for drug discovery. These include early adoption of ultrasound and microwave techniques for chemical synthesis, the use of design of experiment software for reaction optimization, the multi-step use of immobilised reagents, scavengers and catch and release concepts, the generation of encapsulated catalysts for cleaner reaction processing, the use of immobilised enzymes in synthesis, and the impressive advances in the area of flow chemistry and micro reactor technology. The brilliant results achieved by Prof. Ley, documented by over 630 publications in the area of new synthetic methods and their application to biologically active molecules, give him a great visibility in the field of medicinal chemistry and drug discovery.

Professor Neri receives this award for his pioneering work establishing synthetic antibody libraries obtained employing phage display technology. Although this technology is still in its early stages, it holds significant potential for the discovery of new LMW binders to variety of protein targets.

The Prous Science Award for New Technologies in Drug Discovery 2004 for Prof. C. Oliver Kappe

The award was granted to Prof. C. Oliver Kappe, Karl-Franzens University, Graz, on the basis of his outstanding scientific curriculum vitae. In particular, his work on microwave-assisted combinatorial chemistry was considered highly innovative and fruitful.

The Award was presented during the Opening Session of the XVIIIth International Symposium on Medicinal Chemistry, on Sunday, August 15, in Copenhagen, Denmark.