For More Information:
Curt Breneman
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
(518) 276-2678
brenec@rpi.edu
Bill Hayden
Chemical Computing Group
(514) 393-1055
hayden@chemcomp.com
American Chemical Society Division of Computers in Chemistry announces winners of the Chemical Computing Group ExcellenceAward
Washington DC -- August 20, 2000 The American Chemical Society's Division of Computers in Chemistry (COMP) has chosen thefirst five recipients of the newly created Chemical Computing Group Excellence Awards. Through the CCG Excellence Awardprogram COMP will defray the travel expenses of students traveling to ACS national meetings to present their originalresearch.
As part of an agreement between CCG and COMP, CCG will provide $100,000 in merit-based graduate student ACS meeting traveland software licenses over the next three years. Awardees are selected by the COMP Executive Committee on the basis of thescientific merit of abstracts submitted for presentation in the COMP division program, research advisor reference letters,and standard COMP Division award criteria. In addition to the travel award, CCG will give each recipient a one-year licenseto the software package MOE, to be used by the recipient's academic institution for research. "We are very pleased toestablish the CCG Excellence Award in conjunction with COMP," stated Bill Hayden, Vice President of Chemical Computing Group.Awardees are Gregory A. Bakken of Prof. Peter Jurs' group at Pennsylvania State University, Bin Chen for work done with Prof.J. Ilja Siepmann at the University of Minnesota, Gavin (Hui-Hsu) Tsai of Prof. M. Cather Simpson's group at Case WesternReserve University, Melissa L. Plount-Price for work done with Professor Bill Jorgensen at Yale University, and Wei Wang ofProf. Peter Kollman's group at the University of California, San Francisco.
Professor Curt M. Breneman of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, COMP Treasurer and Fundraising Coordinator, offered "The CCGExcellence Award recognizes deserving students while at the same time allowing them to present their work at ACS nationalmeetings where they can interact directly with leading scientists in their field. By making this award possible, CCG ishelping to promote new ideas and is supporting new researchers in the field-important investments in the future of scientificresearch".
The program will continue for the three years. The next set of five students will be selected for the spring 2001 ACSnational meeting in San Diego. Additional information on the Chemical Computing Group Excellence Awards program is availablefrom the COMP division web site http://www.acscomp.org.
About The ACS Division of Computers in Chemistry
The Division of Computers in Chemistry is the ACS center of excellence for all aspects of the use of computers in chemistry.Established in 1974, the division today serves 2300 divisional members and the ACS membership at large. Divisionalprogramming at national meetings provides a forum for original scholarly research, and serves the continuing education needsof the general ACS membership regarding applications of computers in chemistry.
About Chemical Computing Group
Chemical Computing Group develops and markets MOE, the Molecular Operating Environment, the next generation of computerapplication for chemical researchers in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology fields. Its built-in applications cover thespectrum of drug discovery including: Protein/Homology modeling, High Throughput Screening, Combinatorial Library Design,Modeling/Simulations and Methods Development. MOE's unique architecture and platform independence allows it to be used by avariety of researchers from methods developers to computational experts to medicinal chemists. Its customers include aworldwide roster of leading pharmaceutical and biotechnology firms.