The Department of Chemistry was proud to host its first Merck-University of Toronto Lectureship on October 27 & 28.
A lively series of events--including student poster session, career panel, networking opportunities, and eight student flash talks--was capped off by two keynote addresses, according to Professor Sophie Rousseaux, Associate Chair, Graduate Studies. “Approximately 100 attendees were present from the St George and UTM campuses of U of T as well as York University.”
Merck Keynote Speaker Dr. Eugene Kwan gave a talk entitled “Explorations in HTE for Reaction Screening, ML for NMR prediction, and Systems Chemistry,” while academic keynote speaker Professor Robert Phipps of University of Cambridge spoke on “Harnessing Non-Covalent Interactions to Address Selectivity Challenges in Catalysis.”
“Merck typically sponsors 5-10 lectureship series annually, with select academic institutions,” said Rousseaux, “It’s typically been held in the U.S. or at Cambridge in the UK, and this is the first time it’s being held in Canada.”
According to Rousseaux, Merck sent a full delegation of scientists to the student-focused event, which kicked off with a poster session on the 27th to which 29 graduate students, undergraduates and postdoctoral fellows contributed works. The following morning, Merck offered a short talk by Dr. Prabha Karnachi: “Leveraging AI/ML to augment Design-Make-Test-Analyze (DMTA) Cycles in Drug Discovery.”
Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) were a focus for the Merck visit to the department, and to tie in some of the exciting work in that area being led by U of T Chemistry, the schedule for the conference included breakout discussions between delegates and scientists working at the Acceleration Consortium.
“As a pharmaceutical company,” Rousseaux explained, “Merck is engaging deeply with tools like AI/ML to explore their potential to accelerate the drug development pipeline. Chemists can use enabling technologies like AI/ML to start predicting the structure of drugs before deciding what molecules to synthesize. Or a process chemist might start figuring out details of a production process itself... how you can best characterize it and understand where it could potentially fail on large scale. We can use analytical tools and automation tools to be able to do that.”
After lunch on the 28th, a number of students delivered short talks on their research. Andrew Durant of the Lautens Group was one of eight students who gave flash talks at the lectureship event. “Presenting my work to so many accomplished industry scientists was a tremendous honour. The opportunity to connect with them and gain perspectives beyond academia was an invaluable experience along my scientific development,” he said.
Durant said he appreciated being able to connect with Merck scientists in a relaxed environment. “These interactions not only fostered genuine connections but also provided thoughtful advice and perspectives on both science and life.”
Cher-Tian Ser, of the Aspuru-Guzik group, agreed. “It was a great opportunity to have a platform to share my research with the department and the Merck scientists, and the limit on the length of the talks challenged me to deliver a presentation that covered the salient points without missing too many details!”
Ser added, “It was fascinating to hear from such a diverse group of Merck scientists, ranging from discovery to process and even to computational chemistry and machine learning -- and how these different functionalities work across different parts of the drug discovery pipeline together to deliver a final product.”
Professor Rousseaux noted that the visiting Merck scientists came from a wide range of backgrounds. “We hosted people who work in computational chemistry, medicinal chemistry, process chemistry... they have a lot of different interests, work that aligns with research activity happening at U of T.”
Merck Lectureships are generally two-year events, so a hosting institution applies for the chance to host a second event the following year. Department Chair Mark Lautens said he looks forward to a chance to repeat the success of this year’s event.
“We have had a long association with Merck and it has been a favourite destination of our best students,” he said. “For many years we hosted a Merck Frosst Lectureship and invited the best researchers from around the globe.”
Lautens noted that Merck has funded many U of T Chemistry faculty with starting research grants, including himself (they partnered with NSERC to support his Industrial Research Chair.)
“A Merck Symposium does much to bring students into contact with scientists from different domains of the pharmaceutical industry, sharing knowledge. We are so happy to have them back.”
“We very much look forward to our next event,” Lautens concluded.
These interactions not only fostered genuine connections but also provided thoughtful advice and perspectives on both science and life.
-Andrew Durant