Call for Papers: Organic Chemistry for Health

New technologies in organic chemistry have emerged as a major paradigm shift in the development and production of drugs. We are excited to announce a call for papers for a PeerJ Life & Environment and PeerJ Organic Chemistry Special Issue on “Organic Chemistry for Health”, edited by Pedro Silva, Christof Jäger and Eder Lenardao.

Organic Chemistry for Health: Discovery, synthesis, characterisation, and evaluation of new physiologically active compounds

The rational development of novel drugs is a multi-pronged effort that aims to improve the rate at which drug candidates with suitable activity, safety, and metabolic profile are found for later clinical evaluation. The combination of studies in silico with organic synthesis has been shown as a successful method for the discovery of new multi-target bioactive molecules, or hybrids with enhanced activity. The long road of a new drug from the design to the shelf can be shortened, in some cases, by the chemical modification of marketable drugs (molecular hybridization), or by the incorporation of the active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) in new drug-delivery materials.

New technologies in organic synthesis, such as the use of automation and flow chemistry – combined or not with alternative energy sources (sonochemistry and mechanochemistry) – have emerged as a major paradigm shift in the development and production of drugs. Computational methods, particularly the emerging use of machine learning applications to find new, synthesizable, target-specific chemical lead structures, also support the rapid development of new drugs. This special issue invites contributions linking the elements within the discovery of new drug molecules. A particular aim is to connect advances (and automation) in the molecular discovery and synthesis of drug candidates with their physiological and pharmacological evaluation, as well as experimentation with computational approaches.

To find out more and to submit your abstract, please visit https://peerj.com/special-issues/87-org-chem-for-health

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