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Background

Computational molecular modelling has positioned itself during the last 20 years as a tool that covers, in a cross-disciplinary way, many fields of knowledge, from biochemistry to new materials, passing through all the disciplines of chemistry and emerging areas such as nanoscience. In addition to the capacity of predict with high accuracy and at low cost the results of many experimental measures, Theoretical Chemistry allows the understanding of observations at a basic level and to lead the way toward new discoveries. According to Pople and Kohn, Nobel Prizes in chemistry in 1998, “quantum chemistry is used today in all branches of molecular chemistry and physics and offers a deep understanding of molecular processes that can not be obtained only through experimentation”. Therefore, Theoretical Chemistry and Computational Modelling have become today mandatory tools for experimental sciences. This has led to a growing demand for expert staff in these fields. This demand comes not only from the academic world, but also begins to come from industry, where more and more companies are considering modelling at molecular scale as a tool for making rapid progress in the synthesis of new functional substances or new materials, as well as a way of reducing costs for obtaining them and for the study of its properties. It should also be pointed out that the increase of the computing capacity in Europe, through HPC (High Performance Computing) programmes, and in particular in Spain with the creation of RES (Spanish Supercomputing Network), is giving a renewed push to modelling at the molecular level and is making it possible to approach systems that are larger and therefore closer to the experimental systems and applications demanded by industry. The lower cost of simulation is moving many companies into this area and making them create simulation departments or include simulation as an additional tool in their research and development. A growing demand for professionals within the industrial sector is therefore increasing.