Drug development journal publishes special issue to honor Nicholas Meanwell, Distinguished Professor at the Baruch S. Blumberg Institute

A special issue of a major drug development journal published recently honors Nicholas A. Meanwell, PhD, a former pharmaceutical industry scientist and executive who now is a distinguished professor at the Baruch S. Blumberg Institute.

The journal’s June 15 editorial says: “This issue of Medicinal Chemistry Research is dedicated to Dr. Nicholas Meanwell on his retirement from Bristol Myers Squibb Co. (BMS). Fortunately, this milestone does not mean retirement from activities involving the practice of Medicinal Chemistry, but it does provide a good incentive to celebrate a long and impactful ~ 40-year career with a single organization, albeit one that morphed and merged during that span of time.”

Dr. Meanwell received his doctorate from The University of Sheffield (England) in 1976, then went to Wayne State University for his postdoctoral studies. In 1982, he joined Bristol Myers Pharmaceutical R&D as a research scientist at their Indiana facility and later the company’s preclinical drug discovery research site in Wallingford, Conn. In 2018, Dr. Meanwell moved to the Bristol Myers Squibb site in Princeton, N.J., where he served as Scientific Vice President.

Dr. Meanwell is very well known as a distinguished medicinal chemist and for his leadership as an executive director of drug discovery and development, contributing to advances in the areas of hepatitis C (HCV) and HIV therapeutics. These efforts produced the marketed HCV NS5A inhibitor, daclatasvir, the NS3/4A protease inhibitor, asunaprevir, the NS5B allosteric inhibitor, beclabuvir and the HIV-1 attachment inhibitor fostemsavir, which is currently marketed by ViiV Healthcare as Rukobia. The discovery and development of fostemsavir was recently recognized by the American Chemical Society with a Heroes of Chemistry award. Dr. Meanwell joined the Baruch S. Blumberg Institute as a Distinguished Professor after his retirement from Bristol Myers Squibb.

Dr. Meanwell is currently delivering a series of lectures on Drug Design and Development and helps the drug discovery and development program at the Blumberg Institute.