Introduction
Pharmacology is a component of Encyclopedia of Biological, Physiological and Health Sciences in the global Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (EOLSS), which is an integrated compendium of twenty one Encyclopedias.
Pharmacology is the study of the actions of chemicals on the body and most usually it is defined as chemicals that can have a therapeutic action to treat disease. Since it looks at the interaction between chemicals and body systems pharmacology utilizes the basic disciplines of chemistry, biochemistry, physiology, pathology and microbiology in its practice. Pharmacology is a foundation science for pharmacy which is the rational prescribing of drugs to treat disease and the foundation science for toxicology which is the study of the toxic actions of chemicals on the body.
The two volumes are organized in groups of chapters as follows: The first group of chapters discuss pharmacological principles and these include chapters on Pharmacodynamics; Pharmacokinetics, Neuropharmacology, Autonomic Pharmacology and Clinical Pharmacology. The second group of chapters discusses the processes of Drug discovery and the Safety requirements for drugs to be used therapeutically and include Drug Discovery and Safety Pharmacology assessment. The largest group of chapters discuss different therapeutic areas and include Cardiovascular and renal pharmacology; Endocrine pharmacology; Neuropsychopharmacology; Pulmonary Pharmacology; Gastrointestinal pharmacology; Poisons venoms and toxins; Drugs on skeletal muscle; the Pharmacotherapy of inflammation; Reproductive pharmacology; Pain pharmacology and analgesia. The final group of chapters discuss new approaches and include Pharmacogenetics and pharmacogenomics; Immunopharmacology and Gene therapy.
These two volumes are aimed at the following a wide spectrum of audiences from the merely curious to those seeking in-depth knowledge: University and College students Educators, Professional practitioners, Research personnel and Policy analysts, managers, and decision makers and NGOs.
Editor(s) Biography
Professor Majewski graduated with a PhD from Melbourne University in 1979 and has had a long research career in both Germany and Australia holding many prestigious Fellowships with over of 120 publications and 21 PhD students supervised. He joined RMIT in 1999 as a departmental head and was appointed foundation Head of the School of Medical Sciences in 2001. He was responsible at RMIT for the introduction of new degrees in Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences. He established the drug safety facility RDDT in 2003 and this is now a private company. He was a member of the National Committee for Biomedical Sciences and is a former President of the Australasian Society of Clinical and Experimental Pharmacologists and Toxicologists. He is the International Editor for the Theme of Pharmacology in the UNESCO EOLSS project an online textbook for use in the Third world. His research interests are cardiovascular and neuro-pharmacology.
