Global Head of Drug Product Design

What do you do and how is it contributing to tackling climate change and achieving Net Zero?

Hello, my name is Brian Henry, I work for Pfizer in pharmaceutical sciences and I've been in the industry for about 30 years now.

Pharmaceutical Sciences is actually a very exciting department sits right in the middle of the research, development and commercialization processes and of developing new medicines, has a critical role really has three functions.

First of all, we work with the discovery chemists and biologists to select the right molecule, we then have to figure out how to make the material for phase one, phase two, and phase three clinical trials. And finally, we need to transfer that manufacturing knowledge to the commercial manufacturing groups all over the world. This is actually a technically very challenging job, because we need to figure out how to scale up the manufacturing process and that is very, very tough.  

As we start from phase one, we may be making a few kilos, a few thousands of tablets, right through to phase three, where we're making tonnes of material and millions of tablets to be used in trials all over the world. Now as we go through that process, we need to develop safe processes safe for the operators and technicians and scientists in the manufacturing areas, and also safe for the environment. And also each tablet needs to be at the highest quality we can make.  

Now we actually have a critical role in reducing the environmental impact of the medicines we make. About 70 to 80% of the carbon footprint sits in the manufacturing process and as the designers and inventors of those manufacturing process says the decisions, we make will live with that product for the rest of its useful life as a medicine. So it's very, very important that we do our best reduce the environmental impact and make more sustainable medicines going forward.  

As an example of what we're trying to do here to make more sustainable manufacturing processes, we're trying to move away from a very large, massive stainless steel chemistry vessels that we use to synthesise materials and move towards a flow chemistry approach, which not only allows us  much better control and much better quality of the manufacturing process but also reduces the amount of solvent we waste and also the amount of energy we use in making those new medicines.  

So if you're passionate about global health issues, you are passionate about climate change if you want to come and work in a global team environment, to develop new medicines then you should consider a career in pharmaceutical sciences where we really need highly creative technicians, scientists and engineers to come and work with us to try and design his new manufacturer more sustainable manufacturing processes going forward.