Home of the NIGMS Biomolecular Pharmacology Program

Who we are

We are a pharmacology department with primary faculty engaged in cutting-edge research in translational biomedical sciences. We are also dedicated mentors of doctoral students seeking to instill an interdisciplinary approach to discovery.  We are committed to inclusion of individuals regardless of gender, race, color, nationality, ethnicity, disability, religion or sexual orientation. Our strong commitment to a diverse community enriches our teaching, mentoring, and research missions.  We actively support Boston University’s statement on diversity.  Our faculty come together with faculty from multiple departments across the university, and multiple industry partners, including Pfizer and Biogen, to provide a wide variety of research projects relevant to the treatment of diseases of the nervous system, cardiovascular system, and cancer. Together we are part of the NIGMS Biomolecular Pharmacology Training Program that provides an educational experience, balanced in content and style, to mold the thought leaders of academic, industrial, and government service career paths for our students.

What is Pharmacology?

Making a difference

  • BU Pharmacology’s NIGMS T32 funded PROGRAM in BIOMOLECULAR PHARMACOLOGY is one of only four such pharmacological sciences training programs in New England so honored by NIGMS, and was ranked in the top echelon of PhD training programs for research productivity by the 2010 National Research Council report.
  • BU Pharmacology is committed to providing our students training in basic science research. As noted in “NIH Basics” by Francis S. Collins, Director of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, 3 August 10 2012 issue of Science, “The NIH will most assuredly continue its strong tradition of supporting basic research,…In this time of severe budget constraints, Americans need to know that today’s basic research is the engine that powers tomorrow’s therapeutic discoveries.”
  • London Times ranks Boston University 22nd in in the world and 13th in the US for Clinical, Pre-Clinical and Health Sciences.
  • For the past 15 years, we have maintained a strong collaboration with BU’s Biomedical Engineering Department offering an interdisciplinary Biomedical Engineering training program.
  • Based on our strong commitment to curing diseases of the nervous system, we offer a joint degree in pharmacology and biomedical neuroscience as a partner with the new university-wide Graduate Program for Neuroscience. This specialized training opportunity gives students the framework of pharmacological principles to direct their research towards future therapeutics.
  • We partner with Pfizer to offer unique internship and training opportunities so that students have an exposure to the industrial perspective early in their graduate career.
  • With a strong faculty, a focus on science, and a relatively small student body (41 students) we foster a healthy working environment with individual attention for students and labs so that they are best equipped to carry out creative research.

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