Biological sciences degrees, such as pharmacology (see Box 1), open opportunities in research and development (R&D) (see Figure 1). The pharmaceutical R&D process incorporates drug metabolism at many stages. In vitro systems are used in initial research while in vivo animal models are used in preclinical studies, with human drug metabolism being investigated during clinical trials.
Degrees in pharmacology bring an understanding of how medicines impact living systems. One branch of this is drug metabolism. This is the study of how the liver chemically alters medicines, making them more water soluble so that they can be excreted. At a subcellular level, in vitro drug metabolism uses hepatocytes (liver cells) and microsomes (sub-cellular fragments) containing enzymes such as cytochrome P450. These enzymes are responsible for the biotransformation of drugs and proteins, to study routes of drug metabolism. I graduated in pharmacology from Dundee University and went on to a PhD at Chelsea College, London. There I studied chemical predictors of in vitro drug metabolism with a focus on the cytochrome P450 family of enzymes, which are the main enzymes in the liver responsible for metabolising medicines.
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