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Pharmacokinetics expert
Gallo to
direct new research facility
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The School of Pharmacy has appointed James Gallo, an expert in pharmacokinetics,
director of the new Center for Bioanalysis and Pharmacokinetics and professor of
pharmaceutical sciences. Gallo joins Temple from Fox Chase Cancer Center. Pharmacokinetics, the study of how the body absorbs, distributes, metabolizes and eliminates drugs, helps researchers determine the ideal dose of a drug: how much, how often and when. “Each drug follows a unique path to perform its action. Pharmacokinetics, a major part of the drug development process, reveals the course that a drug takes over time by measuring its presence in human fluids,” Gallo explained. “We need to understand this path to be able to design the safest, most effective drug.” The center, staffed and equipped to perform both pharmacokinetic |
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(what the body does to drugs) and pharmacodynamic (what drugs do
to the body) analyses, is the first such facility at Temple.
Scientists and researchers at Temple and beyond need this type of
analytic support for drug research. The centerpiece of the new
facility is a tandem mass spectrometer, a very sophisticated,
precise tool used to measure extremely small quantities of drugs.
Gallo’s own research is primarily focused on experimental brain
tumor treatments. He is specifically looking at how to enhance
drug accumulation in tumors through an understanding of drug
interactions and drug transport. It’s not enough that a drug can
attack brain tumor cells in the lab dish; the drug needs to be
able to overcome the impervious blood-brain barrier that surrounds
the brain and to reach the tumors in sufficient amounts. |
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