Pharmaceutical Chemistry

The course aims to introduce students to the fundamental concepts of Pharmaceutical Chemistry.

Upon successful completion of the course, students will have acquired the following skills and competencies:

• To understand the fundamental principles of drugs and drug targets.
• To understand the concept of drug targets (protein structure and function; enzymes: structure and function; receptors: structure and function; receptors and signal transduction; nucleic acids: structure and function).
• To understand the principles of pharmacodynamics and pharmacokinetics (enzymes as drug targets; receptors as drug targets; nucleic acids as drug targets; other drug targets; pharmacokinetics and related topics) through the study of representative case studies (e.g., statins).
• To understand the concepts of drug discovery, design and development (drug discovery: identification of lead compounds; drug design: optimisation of target interactions; drug design: optimisation of target accessibility; the pathway to regulatory approval of a medicinal product) through the study of representative case studies (e.g., Case Study 2: Design of angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors; Case Study 3: Artemisinin and related antimalarial drugs; Case Study 4: Design of oxamniquine).
• To understand the tools of pharmaceutical chemistry used in drug discovery and design (combinatorial and parallel synthesis; computational medicinal chemistry; quantitative structure–activity relationships, QSAR) through the study of representative case studies (e.g., design of a thymidylate synthase inhibitor).
• To gain insight into selected topics in pharmaceutical chemistry (antibacterial drugs; antiviral drugs; anticancer drugs; cholinergic agonists, anticholinergic agents and acetylcholinesterase inhibitors; drugs acting on the adrenergic nervous system; opioid analgesics; antiulcer drugs; cardiovascular drugs) through the study of representative case studies, including Case Study 6: Steroidal anti-inflammatory agents; Case Study 7: Current research on antidepressant agents; Case Study 8: Design and development of aliskiren; Case Study 9: Factor Xa inhibitors; and Case Study 10: Reversible inhibitors of the HCV NS3/4A protease.