Past Ralph Connor Memorial Lecturers 2005, P. Roy Vagelos P. Roy Vagelos is former chairman and CEO of Merck and Company. He delivered the 2005 Ralph Connor Memorial Lecture at the March 2005 meeting of the Joseph Priestley Society at CHF. Vagelos spoke on the highs and lows of the pharmaceutical industry, specifically about what has caused the recent drop in the reputation of pharmaceutical companies, and about what the future holds for this industry. Vagelos served as chief executive officer of Merck for nine years, from 1985 to 1994. He was first elected to the Board of Directors in 1984 and served as its chairman from 1986 to 1994. During his tenure as CEO, Merck was named "the most admired corporation in America" for three years in a row by Fortune magazine. Vagelos is the author of Medicine, Science and Merck. 2004, John W. Caldwell "Using the Orange, Seeking the Green, and Helping the Red, White, and Blue: Patent Challenges and Opportunities in Pharmaceutical Business" John W. Caldwell is a partner in Woodcock Washburn, the largest intellectual property firm in the tri-state area of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware. He is a chair of the firm’s patent prosecution and client counseling practice group and specializes in startup business development, patent prosecution, counseling, and licensing, especially in the biotech, chemical, and pharmaceutical arenas. He has established a national reputation for assisting in the transfer of technology from academic institutions to companies so that the technology may be developed into tangible, viable products. He has also been instrumental in securing patent protection for new families of nucleic acid–active drugs; microchip devices that use light rather than electricity; combinatorial drug chemistry; radiographic imaging; sensors for pollution abatement; and new drugs and diagnostics for the treatment of AIDS, cancer, and other diseases. Caldwell is active in the Philadelphia Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts, the American Intellectual Property Law Association (where he serves as president), the American Chemical Association, and other national associations for patent, copyright, and trademark law. He holds a B.A. in chemistry from Rice University, an M.A. in chemistry from Johns Hopkins University, and a J.D. from Villanova School of Law. 2001, Alan G. MacDiarmid Alan G. MacDiarmid, the Blanchard Professor of Chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania, shared the 2000 Nobel Prize in chemistry with Alan J. Heeger and Hideki Shirakawa "for the discovery and development of conductive polymers." The award recognized a remarkable discovery—that under the right circumstances plastic can be made to behave very like a metal, to conduct electricity—a breakthrough that opened the door to a range of polymer-based electronics that can be produced quickly and cheaply. These products may also be a stepping-stone to real molecular-scale electronics, perhaps the next great advance of the computer age. MacDiarmid has received numerous other awards, including the 1999 Award in Materials Chemistry from the American Chemical Society, the Chemical Pioneer Award from the American Institute of Chemists, and the John Scott Award from the City of Philadelphia. He holds more than 28 patents and is the author or coauthor of approximately 600 research papers.