Date: 29 July 2025
Time: 14:00-16:00
Location: ZOOM & Sala Fraga de Azevedo| IHMT-NOVA
Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) are a group of illnesses responsible for high mortality rates and are prevalent worldwide, posing a significant global public health challenge. These diseases are especially common in rural areas of developing countries, where there is a lack of basic sanitation and limited access to healthcare services.
One of the major obstacles to eradicating these diseases is the insufficient investment in the discovery of new drugs, primarily due to the low financial return for pharmaceutical companies. The lack of economic incentives is often tied to the complexity of these diseases, which results in minimal investment in research and development—even though they affect millions of people worldwide.
Therefore, it is essential to develop new political and strategic approaches to tackle NTDs. These should include promoting collaborative efforts and increasing investment in research, treatment, and prevention. The goal is not only to develop effective pharmacological treatments but also to foster socio-environmental development in marginalized regions.
Moreover, innovative strategies in medicinal chemistry are crucial to support safe and effective drug design. In this context, computational methods have emerged as powerful tools in the search for novel treatments against these conditions.
This session will present computer-aided drug design (CADD) methods for the development of new drug prototypes targeting NTDs and other infectious diseases.
About Igor Nascimento
Holds a degree in Pharmacy from the Federal University of Alagoas (2011–2016), a Master’s in Pharmaceutical Sciences (2016–2017), and a PhD in Chemistry (2017–2022), with a strong focus on drug development. His expertise includes natural product chemistry, the synthesis of bioactive organic compounds, and, most prominently, molecular modeling.
He has experience with structure-based drug design (SBDD) methods, such as molecular dynamics, molecular docking, homology modeling, and pharmacophore modeling. He also applies quantum chemistry approaches (DFT) and ligand-based drug design (LBDD) techniques.
His scientific work is centered on the application of molecular modeling tools to identify and develop compounds targeting neglected tropical diseases, viruses, cancer, and inflammation. He has authored 53 scientific articles, 14 book chapters, and 1 edited book, with over 430 citations and an h-index of 13 (Web of Science and Scopus).
He serves as Section Editor for Current Topics in Medicinal Chemistry and Current Medicinal Chemistry, Guest Editor for Pharmaceuticals, a member of the Topical Advisory Panel for the International Journal of Molecular Sciences, and on the Editorial Board of Scientific Reports. He also reviews for journals such as the European Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, Bioorganic Chemistry, and the Journal of Molecular Structure, among others.
Currently, he is a faculty member in the Graduate Program in Pharmaceutical Sciences at UEPB, where he supervises academic master’s research in the field of Pharmaceutical and Medicinal Chemistry.
This session is promoted and co-hosted by VBD Researchers Sofia Cortes and Fátima Nogueira.
Note: The session will be conducted in Portuguese.
If you are a GHTM member, you will receive the details of the session by e-mail. If you are not a GHTM member and would like to join the session, please contact us at ghtm-info@ihmt.unl.pt.