Lecture 1 - Introduction and Case Study

Question 1

a scientist that researches new drugs

Answer 1

pharmacologist

Question 2

a licensed health professional who prepares, dispenses, and advises on medical drugs

Answer 2

pharmacist

Question 3

what is pharmacology?

Answer 3

the science of drugs and their effects on living things

Question 4

what are the two main divisions of pharmacology?

Answer 4

pharmacodynamics and pharmacokinetics

Question 5

how do drugs exert their effects on the body?

Answer 5

by binding to targets and triggering a change in physiology

Question 6

drugs exert their effects on the body by binding to _____

Answer 6

receptors

Question 7

what is pharmacodynamics?

Answer 7

what drugs do to the body

Question 8

includes duration and magnitude of response, and dose-response considerations

Answer 8

pharmacodynamics

Question 9

what is pharmacokinetics?

Answer 9

what the body does to drugs

Question 10

includes measures of drug absorption, distribution, metabolism, and elimination

Answer 10

pharmacokinetics

Question 11

a drug which was marketed as an anti-histamine that did not cause drowsiness

Answer 11

terfenadine (seldane)

Question 12

terfenadine is metabolized by the liver into its active antihistamine form:

Answer 12

fexofenadine

Question 13

the molecular target of a drug

Answer 13

receptors

Question 14

a compound which is not intrinsically active, and is activated by some metabolic step after administration

Answer 14

prodrug

Question 15

if metabolism of terfenadine to fexofenadine is inhibited somehow, the inactive form can circulate in the body and ____

Answer 15

block certain potassium ion channels in the heart

Question 16

what does it mean for a drug to have an off-target effect?

Answer 16

drugs are usually not perfectly specific for one receptor type and will sometimes influence closely related or completely unrelated receptors

Question 17

in the context of pharmcology, what is an adverse event?

Answer 17

an undesirable drug effect which can vary in severity; some are mild/benign and some are lethal

Question 18

the genetic background of a pateint which can affect how they respond to a drug

Answer 18

pharmacogenomics

Question 19

one drug/substance can adversely affect the reponse to another. for instance, ingesting multiple drugs at once can have unexpected consequences

Answer 19

drug interations

Question 20

all of our physiological functions are a result of _____ interacting with _____ in our body

Answer 20

chemicals, proteins

Question 21

target proteins must possess a high _____ for its endogenous _____

Answer 21

affinity, ligand

Question 22

what happends when a ligand binds to a receptor?

Answer 22

some early, recognizable chemical event must occur

Question 23

receptors must possess structural and steric _____ for ligands

Answer 23

specificity

Question 24

receptors are _____ and _____

Answer 24

saturable, finite

Question 25

what is a ligand?

Answer 25

any molecule that binds to a receptor

Question 26

drugs interact with target proteins to produce a change in:

Answer 26

the state of the protein, which is translated into a physiological effect

Question 27

how do drugs bind to receptors?

Answer 27

the vast majority of drugs bind reversibly to proteins

Question 28

true or false: an equilibrium between bound and unbound proteins exists

Answer 28

true

Question 29

what type of interactions allow drugs to bind to proteins?

Answer 29

electrostatic interactions (common, reversible), or covalent bonds (rare, generally irreversible)

Question 30

a drug that binds very tightly to its receptor requires a ______ to achieve the desired therapeutic effect

Answer 30

lower dose

Question 31

drug binding induces a _____ in the receptor, which causes a physiological effect

Answer 31

conformational change

Question 32

are receptors selective or specific?

Answer 32

selective

Question 33

what does it mean for a drug to be selective?

Answer 33

they can bind many different drugs with different affinities