Pharmacology

Why study Pharmacology at Dundee?

Pharmacology is a biomedical science that studies how and where in the body drugs act to produce their effects, from the whole organism down to its individual cells. Most drugs produce their effects by interacting with particular molecular components (e.g. specific proteins) within cells. Pharmacology also considers the body's handling of drugs – how drugs are administered and absorbed, how they distribute within the body, and how they are eventually inactivated and/or excreted, often after being modified in chemical structure by the action of enzymes found in the body.

The term 'drug' encompasses not only the familiar idea of chemicals as medicines (e.g. aspirin, penicillin) or as legal or illegal ‘pleasure promoting’ agents (e.g. alcohol, cannabis) but also includes poisons such as environmental or industrial pollutants, toxins from snakes and other creatures, and agents (e.g. ‘nerve gases’) of potential use in chemical warfare. The study of pharmacology therefore has important links with a variety of factors affecting health and wellbeing in the modern world.

Pharmacology can be studied as a single Honours degree programme or can be combined with another discipline, e.g. physiological sciences, in a Biomedical Sciences degree.

Research-led teaching

Modules available at Levels 3 and 4 give progressively more specialisation in pharmacology, with units in Level 4 being taught by laboratory-based scientists who carry out pharmacology-related research at Ninewells Hospital and Medical School in Dundee, where the Level 4 sessions are held.

Clinical perspective

This location also enables medical colleagues, who are involved in treating patients, to be included in some Level 4 teaching units to provide a first-hand clinical perspective of the use and actions of drugs.

Andrew Holt, who graduated in 1989, says: "The project I chose, in enzyme pharmacology, has shaped my life, in that it led to PhD studies in the same field and, ultimately, a research career in that field. My first two publications came from that undergraduate research project, a source of great pride for me."

• BSc Pharmacology

The study of Pharmacology can be combined with other life science disciplines in a more broadly-based Biomedical Sciences degree:

• BSc Biomedical Sciences

• Anatomical Sciences
• Biochemistry
• Biological Chemistry and Drug Discovery
• Biological Sciences
• Biomedical Sciences
• Forensic Anthropology
• Microbiology
• Molecular Biology
• Molecular Genetics
• Neuroscience
• Physiological Sciences
• Sports Biomedicine