There are many companies—including in the greater Philadelphia/South Jersey region—that work as Contract
Research Organizations (CROs), providing outsourced technical support for these efforts. Giant multinational
pharmaceutical companies, medium-sized biotechnology firms, and small academic labs use CROs because it
allows for critical specialized work to be done without requiring in-house expertise and equipment.
 

Some CROs specialize in more chemistry-focused work, including extraction and analysis of chemicals from
natural products, synthesis of structural analogues, and characterization of compound physiochemical
properties. Other CROs specialize in biological applications, which may include cellular reporter assays and
drug screening, in vitro and in vivo toxicity testing, and behavioral testing. Finally, some CROs specialize in
running clinical trials.
 

One major CRO, Sekisui XenoTech, provides a number of pharmacological services, including in vitro drug
metabolism assays and in vivo ADME investigations. Sekisui XenoTech also, conveniently, produces a number
of publicly available webinars on technologies relevant to what we’ve learned in class. These are available
here: https://www.xenotech.com/scientific-resources/webinar-series

choose one of the many webinars in the link above(be sure to browse all 6

pages), watch it, and write a report on what you learned. Using 11-point standard font with 1-inch margins and
1.15 line spacing, your report should be 2-3 pages in length and should address most or all of the following
questions—as many as are relevant to the topic chosen:
? What is/are the major pharmacology question(s) being addressed in the webinar? Why did you choose
to review this topic?
? Why is the topic important for pharmacology & drug development? How does this topic directly relate to
what we’ve covered in this class?
? What are key technologies used to address the webinar topic?
? What are major questions/concerns remaining in this particular subfield that future research may
address?
? Was there anything you learned from the webinar that was somewhat surprising? Why was it
surprising?
? Was there anything you learned from the webinar that you wish we had covered in more detail in the
course? If so, in which week’s material would you include it and how would it help with further
understanding of the course material?