Special recognition of Jeff Duggan on his retirement
Jeff Duggan, Director, Bioanalytical Mass Spectrometry, Boehringer-Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals (CT, USA) started his career in pharmaceutical bioanalysis over 20 years ago. We would like to say a special thank you for his contribution to bioanalysis and on his retirement we interviewed him about his career highlights. As Jeff reflects on his career path he also shares important advice that he would give to those starting out in the field.
On his retirement Jeff remarked:
“I came to pharmaceutical science form the instrumentation world as a mass spec specialist. At that time, I could see that the Pharma industry was were where I wanted to be. Why? They have expert scientists, state-of-the-art instrumentation, extremely interesting problems to solve, and the promise to help humanity. Using LC–MS/MS to perform quantification of new drugs in plasma carries with it the responsibility to provide the most accurate data possible for critical pharmacokinetic and toxicokinetic analyses, but also to push technology to provide more sensitive and selective methods for today’s potent drug substances. Of particular interest to our lab has been the use of LC–MS/MS to quantify protein therapeutics. We have developed pioneering methodology for high sensitivity protein drug assays using immunocapture techniques and proteolytic digestion, and we have also worked out a solid set of techniques and criteria for their validation in regulated studies. This ambitious undertaking has provided an extremely stimulating environment for our group. This work has been most satisfying, as has been the belief that our analyses directly provide the data used to bring new drugs to market that will help our patients.
In the future, I can see the development of new bioanalytical techniques that rely upon robotics, automation and artificial intelligence to provide highly accurate data more quickly and less invasively. Nevertheless, these efforts will continue to be led by creative bioanalytical scientists harnessing the latest technology.”
Journal articles from Bioanalysis
Bioanalytical method validation considerations for LC–MS/MS assays of therapeutic proteins
Validation of LC–MS/MS bioanalytical methods for protein therapeutics
2013 White Paper on recent issues in bioanalysis: ‘hybrid’ – the best of LBA and LCMS