Prodrugs: effective solutions for solubility, permeability and targeting challenges.

This 2-day inaugural conference on prodrugs was presented by Pharmaceutical Education Associates and covered recent developments in prodrug techniques to solve delivery and targeting issues in drug discovery and development. The speakers were drawn from industry and academia, and the conference was attended mostly by researchers working in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries. A number of topics were presented at the conference, from basic prodrug design and functional group considerations to drug metabolism involving cytochrome P450 enzymes, from increasing water solubility, bioavailability, permeability and stability to tumor targeting, from the development of new anti-inflammatory agents to anti-HIV agents, and from the use of transporters and receptor-mediated endocytosis in prodrug delivery to the use of gene therapy for enzyme delivery to cancer cells and tissues. Several case studies were presented including improved pharmaceutical products in the clinic and at various stages of development.