In 2005, the ACS Green Chemistry Institute (GCI) and the global pharmaceutical corporations developed the ACS GCI Pharmaceutical Roundtable to encourage the integration of green chemistry and green engineering into the pharmaceutical industry. The Roundtable has developed a list of key research areas. The purpose of this perspective is to summarise how that list was agreed, provide an assessment of the current state of the art in those areas and to highlight areas for future improvement.

In 2005, the American Chemical Society (ACS) Green Chemistry Institute (GCI) and global pharmaceutical companies established the ACS GCI Pharmaceutical Roundtable to encourage the integration of green chemistry and engineering into the pharmaceutical industry. The Roundtable developed a list of key research areas in green chemistry in 2007, which has served as a guide for focusing green chemistry research. Following that publication, the Roundtable companies have identified a list of the key green engineering research areas that is intended to be the required companion of the first list. This publication summarizes the process used to identify and agree on the top key green engineering research areas and describes these areas, highlighting their research challenges and opportunities for improvements from the perspective of the pharmaceutical industry.

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