FA501: Pharmacy introductory course

The course aims are important in regard to the student is given knowledge to use and competences to discuss analytical methods described in applicable pharmacopeia’s when they take part in interdisciplinary work situations where the focus is to develop, perform and/or documents analysis of drug formulations and/or drug substances. The course aims are also important for giving the student competences necessary in order to take part in work situations where assessment of the biology of plants and fungi may affect development of drug substances and/or be relevant for prevention of diseases caused by fungi or other parasites and zoonoses.

In relation to the competence profile of the degree it is the explicit focus of the course to:

• Give knowledge and understanding of concepts and principles in selected analytical methods described in pharmacopeia monographs
• Give knowledge and understanding of substances water solubility
• Give knowledge and understanding of the selected methods applicability and knowledge of potential errors related to these methods
• Give knowledge and understanding of GLP
• Give knowledge and understanding of plant identification among selected divisions and angiosperm families
• Give knowledge and understanding of organisms’ anatomy, physiology, reproduction and organ function 
• Give knowledge and understanding of the life cycles of selected plants, fungi, and other organisms involved in parasitism and zoonosis
• Give skills to handle analytical laboratory equipment such as analytical balance, volumetric flask, pH-meter, burette, UV-spectrophotometer, TPC plate ect.
• Give skills in GLP including to conduct laboratory notebook
• Give skills to suitable pipetting, including function check and calibration
• Give skills to calculate substance concentrations and dilution factors used to perform fx. stock solutions and standards that are used for drawing and application of standard curves
• Give skills to calculate the precision of the applied quantitative procedures
• Give skills to identify and determine concentrations of single compounds in solution by titration and by spectrophotometry
• Give skills to prepare a detailed protocol for simple volumetric and gravimetric methods according to the description in monographs from primarily Ph.Eur.
• Give skills to provide an account of the overall biological systematics and taxonomy and their underlying principles  
• Give skills to make simple microscopic preparations of biological material and examine the preparations in a light microscope.
• Give competences to discuss Ph. Eur’s requirements to accuracy and precision related to the applied procedures including the basic single operations (fx. weigh, and volumetric measure of the single operations)
• Give competences to independently plan and perform regular analytical laboratory experiments according to the laboratory security regulations and competences to document results according to the course guidelines in report writing 
• Give competences to discuss issues in relation to regular analysis of drug substances/drugs
• Give competences to assess whether biological aspects of plants and fungi can affect drug development and/or be relevant in regard to prevention of disease arising from fungi, other parasites or zoonotic diseases. 

• Basic compound analysis according to GLP
• Concentration calculation and application of correct units (percentage, molarity etc.)
• Preparation of stock solutions and dilutions of compounds as well as buffer solutions
• Basic aqueous solubility experiments
• Preparation of calibration curves
• Preparation of standard curves in Excel or similar program
• Planning and documentation of experiments
• Biological systematics and taxonomy
• Morphology and anatomy of plants
• The plant kingdom, pharmaceutically relevant plant families
• The biology of fungi, their importance in discovery of new drug compounds and their role in causing disease
• The basic biology and life cycles of other organisms involved in parasitism and zoonosis
• Identification analysis according to Ph. Eur. (identification)
• Test of purity analysis according to Ph. Eur. (Test)
• Quantitative analysis according to Ph. Eur. (Assay)
• Volumetric methods (acid/base titration; redox titration, complexometric titration
• Gravimetric methods
• Spectrophotometric methods
• Equations for chemical reaction and chemical equilibrium

• Terminology training i Ph. Eur. Monography (role reading exercise)
• Calculation training (concentration, percentage, molarity, unites, standard addition) Standard curve in Excel
• Memory exercise by mindmapping in central analytical concepts such as units, precision and accuracy