Graduate Courses

Coordinator: Dr. Patricia Di Ciano

Clinical trials are the pivotal studies needed to get approval to market drugs for medical indications. This course focuses on the fundamentals of conducting clinical trials, with an emphasis on documentation and regulatory requirements. Clinical trials will be defined and some design considerations will be discussed. The course will highlight clinical trial Administration, to give students an overview of managing these studies. The course will provide students with the tools to prepare the major documents needed in a clinical trial.

Grade Scale: Letter Grade
Credits: 0.25 FCE
 

Coordinator: Jeff Henderson

This course is offered in alternate years.

This course will emphasize the biochemical principles and mechanisms underlying the toxicity of drugs and foreign agents. In particular the current hypotheses that explain the events at the molecular level which determine and affect toxicity are examined and critically evaluated. This course is suitable for graduate students of pharmacy, toxicology, pharmacology, biochemistry, environmental science, pathology, neuroscience and medical biophysics. A weekly journal club will also be held after the lectures.

Coordinators: Drs. Ali Salahpour and Martin Beaulieu

This course covers basics and classic concepts of dopamine neurotransmission and pharmacology and it focuses on specific modulators of dopamine neurotransmission (packaging, recapture and dopamine receptors).

Grade Scale: Letter Grade
Credits: 0.25 FCE
 

Coordinator: Dr. R. Bendayan

This course is offered in alternate years.

The course is to provide graduate students with a knowledge of the molecular entities involved in drug transport across biological cell membranes and to emphasize the physiological and clinical significance of these entities. The course will consist of didactic lectures presented in a traditional lecture format, and student presentations, when appropriate a lecture will be replaced by a research seminar.

Coordinator: Dr. Élyse Caron-Beaudoin

The first part of the course would cover basics concepts and mechanisms of hormonal production, regulation of major endocrine glands, and discuss the etiopathology and clinical manifestations of some endocrine disorders.

The second part of the course would focus on the sources and pathways of exposure to various endocrine disrupting substances, as well as the various mechanisms of action of endocrine disruptors (e.g., alteration of hormone receptors, enzyme stimulation or inhibition, alteration in co-activators, etc).

The last part of the course would be an endocrine disrupting seminar, during which each student presents the objectives, methods and main findings of a peer-reviewed publication investigating the endocrine disrupting effects of one or multiple environmental contaminants. The students will also be invited to critique the paper and propose a follow-up research project.

Grade Scale: Letter Grade
Credits: 0.25 FCE
 

Coordinator: Dr. Cindy Woodland

This course provides an overview of the ethical considerations and regulatory frameworks governing drug development. Topics include ethical research principles in drug development, appropriate communication of drug-related information, the role of bioethics in shaping pharmaceutical policy, and Canadian and international regulatory requirements for drug development.

Grade Scale: Letter Grade
Credits: 0.25 FCE
 

Coordinator: Dr. Peter McPherson

The purpose of this course is to provide instruction to incoming graduate students on foundational principles in Pharmacology. Although a significant number of our incoming graduate class have mastered these concepts through our undergraduate PCL programs, an increasing number of our new graduate students come with undergraduate education that does not include a significant instruction in pharmacology.

Incoming students with undergraduate PCL will be allowed to opt of completing this module provided they score 70% or greater on an exam they are able to write in September.

Grade Scale: Letter Grade
Credits: 0.25 FCE
 

Coordinators: Drs. Rachel Tyndale and Meghan Chenoweth

This course will introduce students to basic concepts in human genetics and personalized medicine. Students will be introduced to important pharmacogenomic targets such as drug metabolizing enzymes, transporters, and receptors. Students will be introduced to key resources, methods, and approaches used in the field. Through lectures, journal articles, and case studies, students will learn about the principles of pharmacogenomics and examples of drugs that are impacted by pharmacogenomic variation. Students will be introduced to areas of medicine where pharmacogenomics can be used to optimize patient care. Students will also learn about the barriers and challenges of implementing pharmacogenomics in the clinic.

Grade Scale: Letter Grade
Credits: 0.25 FCE
 

Coordinators: Drs. Ali Salahpour and Martin Beaulieu

This course covers basics and classic concepts around G-protein coupled and expand into state of the art studies, techniques and approaches being currently used for the study of GPCRs.

Grade Scale: Letter Grade
Credits: 0.25 FCE
 

Coordinator: Dr. Basil Hubbard

This course will provide a broad overview of the use of gene-based therapies in medicine. Topics will include: conventional gene therapy, mitochondrial transplantation, recently approved RNA-based silencing and splicing drugs, DNA/mRNA vaccines, and next-generation gene editing tools such as CRISPR/Cas9.

Grade Scale: Letter Grade
Credits: 0.25 FCE