Drug discovery: science and/or art?

Abstract

One of the reason for such healthy and wealthy attitude is that drug discovery is not obvious nor simple nor cheap nor fast, as a rule: a good chemical could imply a fortune even in the few years of validity of the patent. A thorough knowledge of pathophysiology is required in order to design biochemistry able to heal without damaging to much. Intuition and experience are paramount, but nowadays at least a couple of approaches are keen to help.