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Sunday, September 28, 2014

Quantum chemistry

Recent news from Princeton University that describes a technique that can closely approximate lattice energy of molecules may open up new avenues for pharmaceuticals research. Innovations at the boundary of Physics and Chemistry have been slow, primarily due to the lack of flexibility in scientific disciplines that tend to prefer colloquial and incremental improvements to traditional methods. The Princeton team shows how the crystalline form could be predicted using emerging ideas from quantum mechanics. Such processes could be fully incorporated into computational chemistry. With the availability of vast computing power and software technologies, this innovation could usher in the next wave of productivity in pharmaceutical discovery.

Generation gap has been value destroying in most disciplines. Doctors use stethoscopes and engineers use calculators, even though these technologies have been made obsolete for many decades. Similarly, in the labs, once investments are taken into a technology, companies, unaware of the concept of sunk costs, tend to use them forever. In a regime of accelerating knowledge and innovation, the inertia of past knowledge has become exponentially more costly for every discipline, company and individual. Ironically, in the modern world, ignorance with flexibility is a lot more valuable trait than knowledge based on the past coupled with a resistance to change.

Incrementalism is a disease of the past. For the present, looking backward is likely most costly.

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