John Van Drie

Dr. John Van Drie is a veteran drug-hunter, with over 25 years experience in drug discovery, at Novartis, Vertex, and Pharmacia. Internationally recognized as a leader in Computer-Aided Drug Discovery (CADD), he was also one of the pioneers of virtual screening and pharmacofore-based methods. He is currently President of Van Drie Research, a Boston- based company he founded in 2007, to provide in silico services and advice to drug discovery organizations, mainly biotechnology companies working on small-molecule drugs. John has contributed to the discovery of HIV-protease inhibitors, oxazolidinone antibiotics, Hepatitic C protease inhibitors, and Cystic Fibrosis protein-folding correctors. He was trained as a theoretical chemist at Caltech, and also studied as a BAEF Fellow at the Univ. Libre de Bruxelles and was Chair of the Gordon Conference on Computer-Aided Drug Design in 2003.