Course Catalog

All courses and curricular and degree requirements described herein are subject to change or deletion without notice.

2025-2026 Research Discussion Schedule

Fall

PHAR 234: Careers in Biology and Science

Instructor: TBD

This course will expose students to a wide range of career paths for Biomedical Scientists with Ph.D.s. Each session will feature an invited panel from a career path that past BMS graduates have followed. Panelists include BMS alumni and academic or industry leaders who have unique perspectives on career development in their area. The panels are designed to promote discussion and students are encouraged to come with questions relevant to each panel.

TBD - Even Years Only

TBD

PHAR 236: Pharmacokinetics

Instructor: Shu-Juan Chen

The Pharmacokinetics (PK) short course will introduce the basic concepts of how drugs are processed in the body and their applications in clinical practice and toxicology. The course will also cover current topics related to genetic and environmental factors.

TBD

PHAR 295: Molecular Pharmacology Research Discussions

Instructor: Bill Joiner

The Molecular Pharmacology Research Discussion is a weekly presentation, which allows graduate students, post-doctoral scholars, faculty members, and other interested individuals to present topical research for discussion.

Fridays

9:00 – 10:00 AM

Winter

PHAR 222: Fundamentals of Cancer Biology

Instructors: Jing Yang, Steven Dowdy, Frank Furnari

This course outlines a current understanding of genetic mechanisms that underlie carcinogenesis and their impact on cell proliferation, differentiation, angiogenesis, metastasis, and survival. The topics of tumor histopathology, the tumor stem cell phenotype, and cancer drug design are also addressed.

Mondays and Wednesdays

10:00 – 12:00 PM

PHAR 231: Fundamentals of Rigor and Reproducibility

Instructors: Rich Daneman and Alexandra Newton

TBD

TBD - Even Years Only

TBD

PHAR 231: Neurovascular and Cardiovascular Biology

Instructor: Miguel Lopez-Ramirez

This course will concentrate on the cellular and molecular mechanisms that control and maintain the functioning of the neurovascular and cardiovascular systems in both healthy and diseased states. The topics covered will include the molecular and cellular biology of endothelial cells, inflammation, vascular malformations, and gene structure and function analysis relevant to neuro and cardiovascular biology. The course will also integrate new technologies and approaches like precision medicine, AI, and GWAS.

TBD - Odd Years Only

TBD

PHAR 255: Molecular Basis of Drug Action and Disease Therapy

Instructors: Bill Joiner and Roger Sunahara

This course covers the principles of therapeutic action for the treatment of human diseases. We introduce basic system physiology as a primer to frame how various human pathologies arise and provide a detailed description of how therapeutics are used to treat them. The course is divided up into 4 theme-based blocks of lectures and a take-home exam assigned at the end of each block. Blocks include lectures on basic drug action, the cardiovascular system, inflammation, and the nervous system.

Tuesdays and Thursdays

10:00 – 11:50 AM

PHAR 275: Seminars in Pharmacology

Instructors: Andrew Mendiola, Padmini Rangamani, Jing Yang

This course covers three major branches of pharmacology: neurobiology, host microbe interactions, and cancer biology. The course is structured as a combination of a weekly paper discussion and a seminar to provide students an opportunity to advance their skills in critical thinking, evaluation of research literature, and scientific communication through discussion of recently published papers and presented seminars. Another important component of this course is career development; students will interact with seminar speakers during their on-campus visits including through small group lunch discussions.

Tuesdays, 12:00 – 1:00 PM

Thursdays, 1:00 – 3:00 PM

PHAR 295: Molecular Pharmacology Research Discussions

Instructor: Bill Joiner

Fridays

9:00 – 10:00 AM

Spring

PHAR 227: Fluorescence and Imaging Techniques

Instructors: Jin Zhang and Palmer Taylor

This course will introduce fluorescence and imaging techniques to students doing research in the biological and chemical sciences, with a goal of providing both the theoretical basis and real examples of applying these techniques to facilitate biochemical research. The topics covered by this course include basic principles of fluorescence, steady-state fluorescence instrumentation and microscopy, Forster Resonance Energy Transfer (FRET), Time-resolved spectroscopy, Fluorescence polarization, Fluorescence tags, and both small molecule-based and genetically encoded fluorescent biosensors, as well as advanced imaging techniques and quantitative image analysis. As a unique component to this course, imaging experts from other institutions are invited to serve as guest lecturers. The guest lecturer gives a 1-hour lecture and has a 1-hour discussion session with the students enrolled in this course for additional interactions.

TBD

PHAR 231: Intro to Python

Instructor: Joh Schöneberg

Dr. Schöneberg will teach computational image processing with a focus on biological microscopy data. The course will start with the foundations of image processing (what an image represents for the computer, how images can be manipulated and segmented using Python), will go over more advanced image processing applications such as particle tracking and organelle network tracking in 3D and 4D data, and will end with supervised machine learning methods and deep learning methods such as random forests and U-Nets. Students will bring their own microscopy datasets to class and are encouraged to work on them throughout class.

TBD - Odd Years Only

TBD

PHAR 295: Molecular Pharmacology Research Discussions

Instructor: Bill Joiner

Fridays

9:00 – 10:00 AM