Pharmacology Another major focus of the Department of Pharmacology is the development of pharmaceutical products for treating acute neurodegenerative disorders. Caspase 3 is a key enzyme in the process of apoptosis ("programmed cell death") that has recently been implicated in the loss of neurons following a stroke. The pharmacology team made a major contribution by developing a chromium excretion assay using radiolabelled chromium--a sensitive, quantitative measure of GI permeability--that was able to quantify the effect of VIOXX® on GI integrity, and compare it in detail to that of other COX-2 inhibitors, and conventional NSAIDs. |pharmacology|biochemistry|asthma|diabetes|