In order to meet the challenges of tomorrow, MET institute of Pharmacy (MET IOP) organised a one-day seminar for all students and academicians pharmaceutical sciences at the institute recently. The seminar was specially organised to shed light upon the changing aspects of the field.

Addressing the audience, Dr U B Hadkar, director, MET Institute of Pharmacy, said, "The institute pursues the philosophy of perpetual acquisition of knowledge. Apart from academic curriculum, our policy has been to provide value-based education and to expose the hidden potential in the students. Our aim is not to make the students mere job seekers but to make them the architects of their future and it is a step in this direction".

Seminar covered talks by prominent experts on pertinent subjects like novel drug delivery systems, molecular modeling, colon drug delivery system, challenges in radiation biology, cancer, chemotherapeutics and patents. Eminent speakers were Dr B N Pandey from Bhaba Atomic Research Centre (BARC), Dr Alka Mehta, head intellectual property Cell, Cipla, Prof Evans C Coutinho, Bombay College of Pharmacy, Dr S G Deshpande, ex-principal, C U Shah College of Pharmacy and Prof Krishna R Iyer, Bombay College of Pharmacy.

The seminar has summarized that current research in pharmaceutical field focuses to develop new drug molecules with better target specificity and decreased side effects. It has also concluded that computer aided drug design programmes could work in combination with softwares, which can predict the ADME characteristics of a new chemical entity and help in selection of right candidates for further development. Novel drug delivery system can be designed to ensure delivery of drug site of action, better bioavailability and minimum side effect.