World-leading Chemoinformatics Research Group wins national award
Three members of staff from the Information School have received an award for their research and teaching in chemoinformatics.
The Jason Farradane Award is made to an individual or a group of people in recognition of outstanding work in the information profession.
Professor Val Gillet, Professor of Chemoinformatics; Dr John Holliday, Senior Research Manager in Chemoinformatics; and Professor Peter Willett, Professor of Information Science, are current members of the long-standing and highly regarded Chemoinformatics Research Group in the Information School. They picked up their award at the Internet Librarian International 2012 conference in October.
The judges recognised the group's status as one of the world's leading centres of chemoinformatics research, a major contributor to the field of information science, and an exemplar in raising the profile of the information profession.
Peter said: "We welcome this recognition of the group's research over many years, which has resulted in methods that are in regular use in industry around the world."
The success of the group is the result of years of hard work. Val, John and Peter had as their doctoral supervisor Emeritus Professor Mike Lynch, who started Sheffield's research and teaching in chemoinformatics and who was the second ever winner of the Jason Farradane Award back in 1980.
The Chemoinformatics Research Group has been one of the leading centres worldwide for chemoinformatics research for over 40 years, and has been noted as providing ‘the most widely recognised and well-established research and teaching base in the field’.
The Award was made in recognition of the Chemoinformatics Research Group’s work in raising the profile of the information profession within a field of endeavour in a way which has become an exemplar to others; demonstrating excellence in education and training; and for their major contribution to the theory and practice of information science.
An important part of the group’s educational activities has been the training of students who have subsequently gone on to join the chemoinformatics workforce, with some of them now in senior positions. The group’s first publication dates from 1967 and it has made very significant contributions to the theory and practice of chemoinformatics over a period of more than four decades with both its published research and its extensive collaborations with industry.
The group's industrial collaborations over the years include joint research projects with many of the world’s leading pharmaceutical, agrochemical and software companies.
About Jason Farradane
Jason Farradane graduated in chemistry in 1929 at what is now Imperial College and started work in industry as a chemist and documentalist. After working in research at the Ministry of Supply and the Admiralty during World War II, he first made an impact with a paper on the scientific approach to documentation at a Royal Society Scientific Information Conference in 1948.
He was instrumental in establishing the Institute of Information Scientists in 1958 and the first academic courses in information science in 1963 at the precursor of City University, where he became Director of the Centre for Information Science in 1966.
Of Central European origin, his commitment to science was reflected in the name he created for himself – a combination of Faraday and Haldane, two scientists he particularly admired. He saw information science as a step towards understanding and better organising ourselves.
About the Jason Farradane Award
The Jason Farradane Award is given in recognition of an outstanding contribution to the information profession, by meeting one or more of the following criteria:
• raising the profile of the information profession within an organisation or field of endeavour in a way which has become an exemplar to others;
• raising the awareness of the value of information in the workplace;
• demonstrating excellence in education and teaching in information science;
• a major contribution to the theory and practice of information science or information management