Synthesis and evaluation of lung tissue-retentive prodrugs

This PhD studentship is an industrial EPSRC iCASE (https://www.epsrc.ac.uk/skills/students/coll/icase/) in collaboration with the GlaxoSmithKline inhalation Therapeutic Area Unit.

Inhalation is an increasingly important delivery approach for therapeutic agents to the lung. The project seeks to prepare novel pH-triggered lung tissue-retentive prodrugs to deliver drugs in a more efficacious and safe manner and involves chemically linking a set of drug molecules to a lung tissue-retentive groups, generating a set of prodrugs that become activated through a novel pH-sensitive linking group. The main objectives for this project lie in synthetic organic/medicinal chemistry with the design and synthesis of conjugate prodrugs that are activated at pH >6.5, the pH of the lung surface environment, to release the drug over a time course of up to 12-24 hours; coupled with the establishment of analytical methods to define the mechanism of the pH-sensitive activation and measure the decomposition of the prodrugs over the experimental time course.

The project will have a strong synthetic chemistry focus, with the student gaining specific training on the use of key experimental techniques and equipment employed in modern synthetic organic medicinal chemistry.

Training will be provided in synthetic organic medicinal chemistry giving the research student a strong platform to launch their future career.

The work will be based at the School of Pharmacy in Nottingham. Informal enquiries to: Dr Michael Stocks ([Email Address Removed]) and Dr Cynthia Bosquillon ([Email Address Removed]).