Dr. Allan Rettie has decided to step down as Chair of the Department of Medicinal Chemistry, effective June 13, 2014, after serving the School for almost 15 years in that capacity. During this period, Dr. Rettie has effectively guided the department through many curricular and organizational changes, as well as economic challenges. “It is to his credit that Medicinal Chemistry is in as strong a position as it is today,” said Dean Thomas Baillie.
Dr. Rettie obtained a PhD in Pharmaceutical Sciences in 1983 from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England, before moving to Seattle to post-doc with Drs. Mont Juchau and Dr. Bill Trager at the UW in the areas of extrahepatic drug metabolism and metabolic drug-drug interactions, respectively. He joined the faculty of the UW School of Pharmacy in 1987 and became the Medicinal Chemistry Department Chair in 2000.
Dr. Rettie’s research interests have focused mainly on the human P450 enzymes and attempts to understand mechanisms of catalysis, substrate specificity, pharmacogenetic variability and adverse drug reactions related to these monooxygenases. He has published over 150 peer-reviewed papers and held research grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in these topic areas for 24 years. Dr. Rettie has served on the editorial boards of Drug Metabolism and Disposition, Drug Metabolism Reviews, Journal of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Current Drug Metabolism, and Chemico-Biological Interactions, as well as numerous NIH grant review panels.
Dr. Rettie will return to a regular faculty position this summer. “It has been a pleasure working with Allan as a member of the School’s Executive Committee,” said Dean Baillie. “I am grateful for his leadership and I hope everyone will join me in thanking him for his service as Chair.”