Pharmacology and Toxicology Unit

Description of Research Activity

The main research areas of the Division of Veterinary Pharmacology and Toxicology of the Department of Veterinary Sciences can be summarized as follows:

Illicit treatments in livestock: identification of biomarker of illicit treatments in food producing animals through traditional (e.g. changes in biochemical and endocrine parameters), biological (e.g. in vitro methods) and biomolecular assays (proteomics and genomics);

Pharmacodynamics:

• quantification and characterization of adrenergic receptors, steroid hormone receptors, serotonergic receptors and vanilloid receptors (binding and competition assays, Western blotting)
• study of ligand receptor interaction and signaling pathways
• measurement of hormones, neurotransmitters and blood biochemical parameters (RIA, ELISA)
• pharmacodynamics of non steroidal antinflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) in different animal species (in vitro and ex vivo evaluation of cyclooxygenase inhibition);

Drug metabolism:

• in vitro study of metabolism of drugs, additives, environmental contaminants and growth promoters
• in vitro and in vivo study of drug drug interaction

Toxicology: study of the effects induced by environmental contaminants in food producing animals (evaluation of protein profiling by MALDI-TOF, gene expression analysis using Real Time PCR)

Animal Welfare: identification of peripheral markers of stress in different animal species