Much of Nutt's work at Merck involved antithrombosis and antiinflammatory research. Among the drug candidates she developed is an anticlotting drug, GPIIb/IIIa antagonist, now in clinical trials. In her newly created post at Corvas, she will help develop the new company's drug leads in those areas. She took early retirement from Merck to join Corvas, she says, because "I felt I could use some of the expertise I developed at Merck even more in a smaller setting, where a lot of people are much younger, and may not have as much experience."
In the late 1960s, Nutt was a member of the Merck team that was the first to chemically synthesize an enzyme. While the enzyme had no particular biological purpose, Nutt recalls, the endeavor was an attempt to test a synthesis method developed by Merck scientists (R.G. Strachan, W.J. Palveda, R.F. Nutt, et al., Journal of the American Chemical ...
