ULLA expands
The primary objective of the ULLA network is to enhance collaboration within education and research in pharmaceutical sciences between the European universities. Another important objective is to give staff and students of the member institutions increased access to the combined resources of the institutions involved.
ULLA takes the name from the cities of the founding universities of the consortium, namely Uppsala, London, Leiden and Amsterdam. Four new member faculties have since been added and two of these have been included recently.
ULLA now consists of the following members:
- University of Uppsala, Faculty of Pharmacy, Sweden (member since 1992)
- University of London, School of Pharmacy, United Kingdom (member since 1992)
- University of Leiden and Vrije Universitet Amsterdam, the Leiden/Amsterdam Center for Drug Research (LACDR), The Netherlands (member since 1992)
- University of Copenhagen, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Denmark (member since 1996)
- Paris South, Faculty of Pharmacy, France (member since 1997)
- University of Parma, Faculty of Pharmacy, Italy (member since 2006)
- University of Leuven, Faculty of Pharmacy, Belgium (member since 2008)
When adding new members ULLA places emphasis on including high ranking institutions that are complimentary to the other ULLA institutions in their research and teaching missions with the aim of strengthening the profile and range of activities in the consortium.
ULLA is directed by an Executive Committee with representatives from all member institutions.
The consortium is chaired by Prof. Sven Frokjaer, Dean of the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of Copenhagen.
The activities of the consortium are primarily financed by an annual membership fee from the ULLA members.
ULLA PhD summer schools
The organisation of an ULLA Postgraduate Summer School every second year and with the duration of approximately one week has been an integral part of ULLA since the founding of the consortium.
The summer school allows postgraduates from the member institutions to widen their knowledge of updated key issues regarding for instance medicinal chemistry, drug discovery, drug development and economic and management issues of key interest to both academia and industry. Just as importantly it gives postgraduates an optimal opportunity have a great time and to create an international network.
ULLA summer school participants 2007.
Lectures within medicinal chemistry are plentiful at the ULLA summer school and for instance include lectures in Basic medicinal chemistry, Natural products as leads in drug research and Molecular modelling and quantitative SAR.
Grants for students and lecturers
An important objective of the ULLA consortium is to give staff and students of the ULLA member institutions increased access to the resources of the institutions involved. With this aim ULLA provides grants for the following types of exchange activitites:
- MSc exchange students who take courses, write MSc thesis or participate in research at ULLA partner institutions.
- PhD exchange students who participate in PhD courses or undertake PhD traineeships at ULLA partner institutions.
- Academic staff members who teach at ULLA partner institutions as visiting staff members.
Exchanges between the ULLA institutions are popular and the interest has increased in the recent years. ULLA is very pleased with the successful mobility and knowledge transfer between the institutions, especially seen in the light of the general trend that students in large parts of Europe prefer to study abroad in overseas destinations.
ULLA textbooks "ULLA Pharmacy Series"
One of the recent initiatives of ULLA is the launch of a new and innovative series of introductory textbooks in specific areas within pharmaceutical sciences. The books are aimed at PhD and MSc students, undergraduates for specific courses and practising pharmaceutical scientists.
The books are published by “Pharmaceutical Press” in London and are written as collaborative ventures between academic staff members at the ULLA institutions with some contributions from academics from non-ULLA institutions.
Two titles in the ULLA postgraduate pharmacy series, Pharmaceutical Toxicology and Paediatric Drug Handling have been published and a new book International Pharmacy Practice Research will be published in 2008.
The ULLA text books are successful, reasonably priced and are selling well and ULLA plans to add one or two new books to the series per year. Books related to medicinal chemistry by the titles Molecular Biopharmaceutics and Systems Biology are anticipated during the coming years.
ULLA lectures and workshops
One of the primary goals of the ULLA consortium is to increase knowledge exchange and enhance collaboration between staff at the ULLA member institutions. One of the ways to reach this goal is to make use of external lecturers from ULLA partner institutions in seminars, workshops and courses. The ULLA consortium has recently decided to increase the number of ULLA lectures so that each institution will once a year arrange an ULLA lecture, i.e. invite a staff member at another institution to give a lecture.
ULLA, furthermore, aims at arranging an increased number of ULLA workshops on specific and specialised topics within pharmaceutical sciences. The idea is to bring together specialised academics from the ULLA institutions, non-ULLA institutions and representatives from industry with the aim at sharing experiences and discuss possible future co-operation projects and funding opportunities.
An ULLA workshop on Process Analytical Technology has been arranged and the success of this workshop gives ULLA an inclination to arrange more workshops in future.
ULLA and external relations
ULLA has until recently primarily aimed its activities internally, i.e. at providing more and better opportunities for staff and students within the ULLA consortium.
The Executive Committee of the consortium has, however, decided to launch activities that make ULLA visible externally and enable ULLA to have a greater impact on the European scene.
One of these activities is to draw up a position paper on pharmaceutical sciences identity including a definition of the pharmaceutical sciences research field and ULLA’s vision on the future of pharmaceutical sciences. The position paper will provide a tool for explaining the scientific community what characterises pharmaceutical sciences and take an active part in the discussion on where and how pharmaceutical sciences should develop.
Another new activity is to host a session on Personalised Medicine at the PharmSciFair 2009. The idea is to combine and make use of the expertise of the academics from the ULLA member institutions in a joint session. We hope to see many of you there.
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