ChEMBL

For those of you of a certain age and interests the "I am not a number, I am a free man" phrase will mean a lot, to others nothing. Of course, on the internet you are never more than someone else's UID, but sometimes it's important to publicly make yourself unique.

I have a "rare" name, relatively - but even so some confusion is possible - there's the John Overington who is a politician in the States, and even in the scientific literature some confusion is possible with a new researcher Jeff Overington. e.g.

Overington, Jeff, et al. "Cysteine Proteases in Supernatants From Colonic Biopsies Obtained From Diarrhea-Predominant IBS Patients Evoke Sustained Hyperexcitability of Colonic Dorsal Root Ganglia Neurons." Gastroenterology140.5 (2011): S-523.

If you have a common name, like Li, for example - it's easy to get lost in the crowd.

To potentially solve this problem the ORCID ID is an attempt to give researchers a unique and persistent identifier for publications and other related stuff (like grants, patents, awards, and so on) that will survive change of name due to marriage, divorce, just 'cos you fancy a new name, or maybe even witness protection programs. However, the orcid website sums up the aims a lot more coherently....

ORCID provides a persistent digital identifier that distinguishes you from every other researcher and, through integration in key research workflows such as manuscript and grant submission, supports automated linkages between you and your professional activities ensuring that your work is recognized.


This page lists the ORCIDs of the members of the ChEMBL Team and Overington Research Group - not everyone has one at the moment, but those that do are listed here - we'll try and remember to keep this page up to date.

0000-0002-5859-1064 is in 'real' life John P. Overington.
0000-0003-0717-1817 is in 'real' life Gerard Van Westen.
0000-0002-8314-7061 is in 'real' life George Papadatos
0000-0002-8011-0300 is in 'real' life Mark Davies
0000-0002-6054-5622 is in 'real' life Felix Kruger


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