Department of Pharmaceutics

Pharmaceutics specialty was first established in the 1950s, and the Department of Pharmaceutics was founded in 1996 by merging the Divisions of Pharmaceutics, Physical Chemistry, and Pharmaceutical Analysis and was headed by Professor Wei Shu-li during 1996 - 1999. Department had been re-organized in 2003 by incorporating the Division of Pharmaceutics with Division of Physical Chemistry and was headed by Professor Zhang Qiang. The current Head of the Department is Professor Lu Wei, and the Deputy Heads are Professor Lu Wan-liang, Associate Professor Liu Yan, and Professor Qi Xian-rong. Department of Pharmaceutics has staff of 16, including 5 professors and Doctoral Advisors, 6 associate professors and Master Advisors.

The Department of Pharmaceutics offers a total of 20 theory/experimental teaching curriculums for undergraduate, Master and PhD students, including Pharmaceutics, Biopharmaceutics and Pharmacokinetics as well as Physical Chemistry as the core curriculums. Professors of the Department together with the invited well-known domestic experts have edited three special pharmaceutical textbooks for 6-year system students of Peking University, including Pharmaceutics, Biopharmaceutics and Pharmacokinetics, and Physical Chemistry. Biopharmaceutics and Pharmacokinetics has been awarded as the boutique curriculum of Peking University Health Science Center. As the granted doctoral program of Education Ministry, the Department is able to enroll Master postgraduates, and Ph.D students and postdoctoral fellows.

Research in the Department of Pharmaceutics covers three main aspects, including the molecular pharmaceutics of novel drug delivery systems, population pharmacokinetics and PKPD modeling and simulations, as well as physical pharmacy. The research outcomes have produced important impact in the related fields in domestic and overseas. Department of Pharmaceutics is undertaking or has completed a number of national and provincial research grants, including the National Key Science Research Program of China (973 program), the Key Grant for New Drug Formulations, the Grants of National Natural Science Foundation, the Grants of National High-Tech Research and Development Program (863 Program), and the Grants of Beijing Natural Science Foundation, etc. In latest years, researchers in the Department have published nearly 200 papers in the high level peer-reviewed international journals, have been awarded more than 20 research prizes, and have completed over 30 state-level research tasks. The Division of Pharmaceutics and Biopharmaceutics in the Department has been included into the key construction projects of Peking University "211 Project", and selected as the Innovation Team of Ministry of Education.

Department of Pharmaceutics have extensively academic communications with dozens of colleges or departments at the renowned universities such as University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the United States, University of Toronto in Canada, Hoshi University in Japan, and Toyama University in Japan, National University of Singapore, Chinese University of Hong Kong, and University of Macao. And the Department has established research collaboration with famous international pharmaceutical companies such as Novo Nordisk and Pfizer, set up a Peking University / Pfizer Pharmacometrics Center for training high level talents of population pharmacokinetics.

Department of Pharmaceutics possesses regular facilities for studies on the molecular pharmaceutics, and the core facilities include tableting machine, multifunctional stability test apparatus, API-4000 LC-MS, laser light scattering particle size analyzer (Malven Zetasizer Nano-ZS), small animal in vivo imaging device (Kodak), HPLC analyzer, Buchi-290 spray-dryer, Millrock REVO85 box-type freeze-dryer, and high-pressure homogenizer, etc..

The development objectives of the department are to establish a top-class discipline to train the leading academic talents at levels of Bachelor, Master of Science, and Doctor of Philosophy.