Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care

Molecular Pharmacology of Anesthetics and Analgetics

This mature program focuses on how the inhaled anesthetics work at the most fundamental level.

These drugs, introduced over 160 years ago, are now used in almost 100 million patients per year, and are the most toxic of all approved pharmaceuticals. Being volatile, low affinity and promiscuous, their mechanism has been particularly enigmatic.

Jonas Johansson uses de-novo protein design strategies to understand optimal anesthetic binding features, while Roderic Eckenhoff uses these features to screen PDB entries for novel targets, and verify features through direct binding measurements. Both physician investigators have been instrumental in developing new methodology for characterization of inhaled anesthetic binding.

Max Kelz focuses on specific brain regions, notably the sleep centers, as being uniquely involved in the hypnotic actions of the inhaled anesthetics.

This theme is marked by strong collaborations with the departments of Biochemistry/Biophysics, Pharmacology, and the Sleep Center in the School of Medicine, the Departments of Biology and Chemistry in the School of Arts and Sciences, and institutions such as the University of Pittsburgh and Drexel University. The interdisciplinary approach is highlighted by support from an NIGMS program project grant (P-01 55876). Many cutting edge approaches in biophysics, biochemistry, genomics and proteomics are being employed.

 

 

 

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