Small molecule therapeutics continue to form the backbone of therapies for all types of life-threatening diseases. The last decade has seen considerable progress in delivering precision inhibitors which provide clinically meaningful benefit for patients suffering from cancer. In the desire to balance efficacy and tolerability candidate profiles become more sophisticated and resulting molecular design challenges more complex.
In my lecture I will discuss examples of impactful small molecule drugs with a focus on underlying design principles and enabling technologies. I will outline design challenges and emerging solutions for novel small molecule drug modalities including molecular degraders and antibody payloads.
Ingo Hartung, Executive Director, Head of Medicinal Chemistry & Drug Design, Merck Healthcare KGaA
