Experimental Toxicology Division
Organization: Pharmacokinetics Branch
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Mission Statement
Michael Devito,
Branch Chief
The Pharmacokinetics Branch (PKB) conducts research on the mechanisms that influence the pharmacokinetic properties of chemicals, and the nature of the dose-response for important chemicals or chemical classes. PKB work consists of a close interplay between experimental studies and model development. This approach permits the development of structure activity relationships and the derivation of prototypical mechanisms for important classes of chemicals. In the past five years, PKB has worked to develop physiologically-based pharmacokinetic (PBPK) models on prototypical compounds, relying whenever possible on in-house experimental data to derive input parameters for the models. Prototypical compounds have been selected from general classes of volatile organic compounds (VOCs/halacarbons), nonvolatiles/halogenated aromatic hydrocarbons, and metals/sulfur-seeking metalloids/arsenic. An area of special emphasis in PKB is the study of mixtures and interaction mechanisms.