What can I do with an MSc in Pharmaceutical Design and Engineering
MSc graduates from ‘Pharmaceutical Design and Engineering’ are highly attractive to the pharmaceutical industry, since this industry sector itself has been heavily involved in defining the knowledge profile of the MSc programme and thereby the competencies of a Pharmaceutical design and Engineering MSc graduate.
Pharmaceutical companies are therefore confident that an MSc graduate in Pharmaceutical Design and Engineering from DTU has a solid, basic knowledge of the pharmaceutical development process—combined with the highest possible academic knowledge within his or her pharma relevant specialization.
However, you might also have the opportunity to continue your studies and pursue a PhD, for instance at DTU.
Typical fields of work
As a pharmaceutical engineer, you have gained extensive knowledge of the entire pharmaceutical development process, and throughout the MSc programme, you have engaged in project-oriented and interdisciplinary team work with students from various bachelor programmes. Therefore, depending on your specialization, you will have the qualifications to fill management positions anywhere in the pharma industry—both in connection with basic research and development for discovery and lead optimization, and business processes (rights management, licensing, and marketing).
The MSc programme’s focus on biopharma also gives you a specific advantage in relation to working with drugs based on biological molecules, which is a global growth area in the pharmaceutical industry and is strongly represented by the pharmaceutical companies in the Oresund region.
Career opportunities
Our graduates are employed by Danish and international pharmaceutical companies, where they are involved in the various stages of drug development, including basic research and development as well as preclinical research in animal and cell models, and in production-related areas such as CMC production design and documentation, i.e. including the clinical stages. Examples of specific areas of expertise are drug delivery, vaccine development, development of antibodies for diagnostic, preventive and treatment purposes, biomarker discovery, validation and development of new assay methods.
In the research and development area, pharmaceutical engineers typically find jobs as specialists or team leaders in large and medium-sized pharmaceutical, vaccine and diagnostic companies, or specialists in smaller companies in the same sectors.
As a pharmaceutical engineer, you can also serve as a link between preclinical phases and the various phases of clinical testing, and you can carry out market- and commercial rights-related tasks in connection with product marketing, IPR, and monitoring in collaboration with financial and legal stakeholders.
With an MSc degree in Pharmaceutical Design and Engineering, you are furthermore qualified for jobs in the patent business.
Finally, pharmaceutical engineers can conduct research and lecture at universities and other public research institutions or serve as specialists with public agencies.
Pursue a PhD
Once you have an MSc in Engineering, you might get the opportunity to continue your studies and apply for admission to the three-year PhD which at DTU is a research-based programme ranking among the best in the world. You can do either a regular PhD or an industrial PhD, the latter with concurrent employment in a company.
As a PhD student, you will be part of a research group and have to carry out an independent scientific project.