Dr Steve Jenkinson is Vice President of Drug Discovery and Safety Assessment at Metrion Biosciences, bringing over 25 years of experience in drug discovery and in vitro safety pharmacology within the pharmaceutical industry. Steve is a recognised thought leader in his field, with deep expertise in secondary pharmacology and a strong track record of managing drug discovery programmes across multiple therapeutic areas and stages—from target identification through to the nomination of preclinical development candidates.

At Metrion, Steve provides strategic scientific guidance to customers, helping them identify and manage potential safety liabilities in their drug discovery programmes. He also serves as the primary business development contact for customers based in the United States.

Prior to joining Metrion, Steve held senior drug discovery roles at GSK and Tanabe Research Laboratories, leading multidisciplinary teams focused on a range of therapeutic targets and modalities. He then joined Pfizer, where he served as Senior Director and established, developed, and led the in vitro secondary pharmacology team. During his tenure, he also led Pfizer’s Global In Vitro Safety Pharmacology team and played an active role in key cross-industry consortia, including serving as co-chair of the IQ DruSafe Secondary Pharmacology Working Group and as a member of the FDA’s HESI Pro-Arrhythmia Group.

Steve has provided critical in vitro safety pharmacology support to numerous drug discovery programmes, including those that have progressed to marketed therapies—most notably contributing to the development of Paxlovid. He has authored 55 peer-reviewed publications.

He holds a BSc (Hons) in Pharmacology from the University of Glasgow, a PhD in Pharmacology from the University of Leicester, and completed post-doctoral research at The Scripps Research Institute in San Diego. He also holds a Master of Advanced Studies (MAS) in Clinical Research from the University of California, San Diego.