Leeds University in process innovation link-up to pharma sector

The UK University of Leeds has launched the Institute of Process Research and Development - iPRD - a new organisation to link university research capacity more strongly to commercial needs for applied innovation in fine chemicals and pharmaceuticals.

With support from the private sector, one of iPRD's key missions will be to leverage public and private funding to deliver lower cost, cleaner and more sustainable products.

"Challenges to the pharma industry increasingly call for greater efficiency and lower impact from production processes, which ultimately depend upon closer links between chemistry and engineering disciplines", says iPRD director Dr John Blacker. "Enabling and forging those stronger links between academic research and industry-wide commercial challenges is a major part of our mission."

In a matching initiative, the iPRD is launching a new MSc course in Chemical Process Research and Development in September. This will fully integrate the chemistry and engineering aspects of pharma process development and help to address the shortage of postgraduates with interdisciplinary skills.

iPRD is currently engaged in a variety of public-private funded projects, ranging from destruction of organic-aqueous waste, to new controls in crystallization and novel continuous processes - to non-genotoxic catalytic alkylations.

To share project information and focus on processing issues, iPRD has formed an industrial club. This interacts regularly with the academic group - and acts as a first research step for members" technical challenges.

Low membership fees and club benefits have attracted a mix of large and small companies from across the pharma, agrochemical and fine chemicals sectors.

The iPRD brings together teams from the University's highly-regarded School of Chemistry and the School of Process, Environmental and Materials Engineering. Combined skills embrace chemical manufacturing, from route design to catalysis, process development, purification and waste management.

iPRD's new MSc course is thought to be unique, with only a handful of broadly comparable programmes available - all outside the UK. A number of pharmaceutical and fine chemical companies will teach course modules at Leeds, award bursaries and provide industrial placements for the research project component of the MSc.

The iPRD has plans for an integrated MSc/PhD programme - comprising a one-year MSc followed by a major research project leading to a PhD - making graduates even more attractive to industry.