The Billion-Dollar Molecule - (Touchstone Book) by Barry Werth (Paperback)

About the Book

This inside account of Vertex, a start-up pharmaceutical company, conveys the exciting drama being played out in the pioneering and enormously profitable field of drug research. Vertex is dedicated to designing--atom by atom--a new life-saving immunosuppressant drug that has major implications for HIV research.

Book Synopsis

Join journalist Barry Werth as he pulls back the curtain on Vertex, a start-up pharmaceutical company, and witness firsthand the intense drama being played out in the pioneering and hugely profitable field of drug research.

Founded by Joshua Boger, a dynamic Harvard- and Merck-trained scientific whiz kid, Vertex is dedicated to designing--atom by atom--both a new life-saving immunosuppressant drug, and a drug to combat the virus that causes AIDS.

You will be hooked from start to finish, as you go from the labs, where obsessive, fiercely competitive scientists struggle for a breakthrough, to Wall Street, where the wheeling and dealing takes on a life of its own, as Boger courts investors and finally decides to take Vertex public. Here is a fascinating no-holds-barred account of the business of science, which includes an updated epilogue about the most recent developments in the quest for a drug to cure AIDS.

Review Quotes

Geoffrey Smith Business Week A riveting tale that has more in common with a John Grisham thriller than with tomes on modern science.

John Schwartz The Washington Post The inside skinny...a high stakes tale of adventure and intrigue: Barbarians at the Lab. Werth's work is a gem.

John Travis The Boston Globe Fascinating...gripping...must reading for anyone curious about an industry that promises to revolutionize medical care in the next century.

About the Author

Barry Werth is an award-winning journalist whose articles have appeared in such publications as The New York Times, Washington Monthly, and GQ, where he is a writer-at-large. Currently at work on an expose about doctors and lawyers, he lives in Northampton, Massachusetts.