News and Events

SPECIAL COURSE: July 13-16, 2010
Basic Pharmacokinetic Concepts for the Pharmaceutical Scientist

The "Basic Pharmacokinetic Concepts for the Pharmaceutical Scientist" course will again be held at the College of Pharmacy, University of Minnesota in Minneapolis.  This course will be valuable for the academic or industrial scientist seeking a basic understanding of pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics to further his or her own work and to more effectively interact with scientists involved in pharmacokinetic and drug delivery research.  Concepts developed in this course are essential in the evaluation of traditional dosage forms and innovative medical delivery systems and devices.

The overall goal of the course will be to present fundamental pharmacokinetic concepts in a manner that will allow participants without a specific pharmacokinetic background to apply these principles in their work.  This 3- to 4-day course will deal with the important pharmacokinetic principles that describe drug absorption, distribution, metabolism and elimination.  The course faculty, Professors William Elmquist, Ronald Sawchuk and Cheryl Zimmerman, will present lectures and workshops with the idea of practical application of fundamental concepts.

To learn more about the 2009 course and to get registration information, please go to the program's web site at http://ce.pharmacy.umn.edu/kinetics. 

The Department of Pharmaceutics welcomed new graduate students for Fall 2009:

Ms. CeCe Baum, B.A. in Chemistry, B.A. and M.A. in Art History, University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minnesota
Mr. Mike Burcusa, B.A. in Chemistry, Carleton College, Northfield, Minnesota
Ms. Khushboo Kothari, B.Pharm., Bombay College of Pharmacy, Mumbai, India
Mr. Lin Niu, B.S. in Pharmacy, M.S. in Immunology, Tongji Medical University, Wuhan, China
Ms. Jie Zhou, B.S. in Biotechnology, M.S. in Biomedical Engineering, Shanghai Jiaotong University, Shanghai, China

August 26-27, 2009

SUE-CHIH LEE, Ph.D.
Food and Drug Administration, Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, Office of Translational Sciences, Office of Clinical Pharmacology

1. “How the FDA's Office of Clinical Pharmacology (OCP) Fits Into Drug Development and Review: Overview of the OCP”
2. "FDA Critical Path Initiatives: What Are the Opportunities?"

Dr. Lee received her B.S. degree in pharmacy from National Taiwan University, and her Ph.D. degree in Pharmaceutics from the University of Minnesota.  She held positions as a research scientist at Bristol Myers and USP before joining the FDA’s Office of Generic Drugs in 1991.  In 1994, she transferred to the Office of Clinical Pharmacology and Biopharmaceutics as a reviewer.  Within that office, she had experiences with drugs related to inflammation, infectious diseases, dermatology and gastroenterology.  Currently, she is a Clinical Pharmacology Team Leader responsible for gastroenterology and inborn error drug products. 

CIMA Lectureship and Fellowship Presentation

Jindřich (Henry) Kopeček, Ph.D., was invited to present the CIMA Laboratories Lecture on "Polymeric Nanomedicines: Biorecognition and Efficacy" on May 29, 2009.  Dr. Kopecek is a Distinguished Professor of Pharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Chemistry, and a Distinguished Professor of the Department of Bioengineering at the University of Utah.  His research is focused on the design, synthesis and characterization of biorecognizable biomedical polymers.

Mr. Jing Wang and Mr. Sunny Bhardwaj, both Ph.D. candidates in the Dept. of Pharmaceutics, were the recipients of a 2009-2010 CIMA Fellowship. The fellowships were presented by Dr. Richard Welter, Vice President of Business Development at CIMA Labs. Faculty advisors for Wang and Bhardwaj are Prof. Cheryl Zimmerman and Prof. Raj Surynarayanan, respectively. 

The Department of Pharmaceutics proudly announces recent graduates:

• Yuanyuan Xie, Ph.D. [2008] Thesis: Deposition of Magnetic Aerosol Particles. Advisor: Prof. Timothy Wiedmann
• Nagdeep Giri, Ph.D. [2008] Thesis: Targeted Delivery of Anti-Retroviral Nucleosides: Role of Breast Cancer Resistance Protein.  Advisor: Prof. William Elmquist
• Sisir Bhattacharya, Ph.D. [2008] Thesis: Molecular Mobility in Amorphous Pharmaceuticals: Implications of Heterogeneity.  Advisor: Prof. Raj Suryanarayanan
• Dabing Chen, Ph.D. [2009] Thesis: Hygroscopicity of Pharmaceutical Crystals. Advisor: Prof. Raj Suryanarayanan
• Shyeilla Dhuria, Ph.D. [2009] Thesis: Intranasal Targeting of Neuropeptides to the Central Nervous System: Evaluation of Pharmacokinetics, Pharmacodynamics, and a Novel Vasoconstrictor Formulation.  Advisor: Prof. William Frey II
• Ying Chen, Ph.D. [2009] Thesis: Active Transport and CNS Delivery of Novel Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitors.  Advisor: Prof. William Elmquist

[August 2008] Assistant Professor Calvin Sun has been selected as a recipient of a 2008 New Investigator Grant in Pharmaceutics and Drug Delivery and Pharmaceutical Technologies.  The purpose of this award, sponsored by Pfizer Global R&D, is to recognize outstanding new investigators.  The award will be presented at the annual AAPS Meeting in Atlanta, Georgia in November.

[July 2008] Changquan Calvin Sun, Ph.D., has joined the Pharmaceutics Department as an Assistant Professor.  After earning his Ph.D. degree in 2000 in the laboratory of Professor David J.W. Grant, he spent eight years in the pharmaceutical industry.  Dr. Sun's research focuses on the area of physical pharmacy.

[July 2008] Carolyn A. Fairbanks, Ph.D., has been promoted to Associate Professor of Pharmaceutics.

[May 2008] Paroma Chakravarty is a 2008-09 recipient of the Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship from the University of Minnesota Graduate School for her thesis research on phase transformation in pharmaceutical systems comprising multiple hydrate phases: thermodynamics, kinetics, and the role of crystal structure. Her advisor is Dr. Raj Suryanarayanan.