Call for Nominations - EFMC Prizes 2019

To acknowledge and recognise an outstanding young medicinal chemist (≤ 12 years after PhD) working in industry or in academia within Europe, EFMC established the "EFMC Prize for a Young Medicinal Chemist in Industry" and the "EFMC Prize for a Young Medicinal Chemist in Academia".

The Prizes consists of a diploma, € 1.000 and an invitation for a short presentation at the 8th edition of the EFMC International Symposium on Advances in Synthetic and Medicinal Chemistry (EFMC-ASMC’19), which will be held in Athens, Greece on September 1-5, 2019.

More information on www.efmc.info/prizes

Deadline for Nominations/Applications: January 31, 2019

EFMC-Young Scientists Network

Building a strong network at the very early stage in your career is crucial. Therefore, EFMC decided to create a new network for young scientists: the EFMC-Young Scientists Network.

The aim of the EFMC-YSN is to inspire, connect and provide opportunities to medicinal chemists and chemical biologists under the age of 35 by:

holding dedicated events & competitions
offering awards to best PhDs & Post-docs
funding grants and scholarships to attend EFMC organised and sponsored events
providing a forum to exchange, seek advices and mentoring

Shaping itself it into a usefull tool, custom-made to your needs and managed by young scientists, for young scientists.

Join the EFMC-YSN now and get access to the content as it becomes available in the following weeks/months.

Questions? Reach out to us at ysn@efmc.info

Joint EFMC|EuChemS workshop - Parkinson’s disease: causes & cures – registration open

A workshop co-organised by the European Chemical Society (EuChemS) and the European Federation of Medicinal Chemistry (EFMC), and chaired by Member of the European Parliament Pavel Poc will look at Parkinson’s disease: causes and cures at the European Parliament (Brussels, Belgium)on 8 November 2018.

Registration is now open! Click here to regsiter and for further information (outline, programme, speakers, abstracts).

Parkinson’s is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder having no known cause, typically with onset later in life. Prevalence in the 60-69-year-old population is estimated to be approximately 1.0%, rising to 2.7% in those over 80. There are more than one million people living with Parkinson’s today in Europe; with an ageing population this figure is forecast to double by 2030. The condition is characterised by difficulty in moving and tremor, as well as psychiatric issues. It leads to a progressive reduction in the quality of life and those affected require increasing care. This imposes a significant socioeconomic burden which currently amounts to €13.9 billion of healthcare expenditure annually.

There is no cure for Parkinson’s yet. The current ‘gold standard’ medication, levodopa, was introduced in 1967, with few new therapeutic agents being registered since then. As such, there is an urgent need to develop new and better treatments. However, despite clinical strategies remaining largely unchanged over the past 50 years, our understanding of the disease mechanisms in Parkinson’s has advanced dramatically, revealing novel druggable targets. Hence, the disorder is in need of extra investment to translate these exciting opportunities into life changing therapies for patients.

In addition to genetic mutations, a potential risk factor for Parkinson’s disease is exposure to some toxins or herbicides, including diquat. In 2015, the European Food Safety Agency (EFSA) declared the herbicide to be potentially harmful and indicated it should be banned. The European Commission did not submit the proposal to the ScoPAFF, and invited EFSA to revise its opinion.

The workshop aims to look at the causes of Parkinson’s disease as well as possible ways forward, both clinically, but also on a political level, notably through the upcoming Horizon Europe research framework programme.

EFMC is supporting the International Year of the Periodic Table of Chemical Elements 2019 (IYPT2019)

EFMC is supporting the new EuChemS Periodic Table, depicting the issue of element scarcity on the occasion of the upcoming International Year of the Periodic Table of Chemical Elements 2019 (IYPT2019). The EFMC shares their hope that this image will lead to reflection, and ultimately action, that it will raise awareness of the threat this poses and also hope to see it have an impact on policy, education and on individual actions.

The Periodic Table has a lot of potential, and could be disseminated in an effective way by providing schools, universities and wider networks with it, whether in hard copies or electronically. Please feel free to also use it to print onto various merchandise items, such as T-shirts, bags, ….

The Periodic Table is now freely downloadable in high resolution on EuChemS’ website. The work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution NoDerivs CC BY-ND.

Support notes, which explain in more detail how the Periodic Table has been designed, and which also include some questions for students, will soon be available for download on our website. Versions in other languages are to be developed.

We strongly encourage you to share it as widely as possible (website, social media, …).

If you have any questions, please contact the EuChemS Secretariat at: secretariat@euchems.eu

The Section of Synthetic Drug of the Czech Pharmaceutical Society joined the EFMC

The EFMC is thrilled to announce that the Section of Synthetic Drug of the Czech Pharmaceutical Society has joined the Federation, becoming the 26th National Adhering Organisation of the EFMC.

It represents one more step in the aim of the EFMC to represent medicinal chemistry and chemical bioology societies in Europe, and we look forward to develop strong links with the local Czech scientific community.

We invite you to have a look at their website.