Overview

The success of pharmacological management of psychiatric disorders, has revolutionized care, over the last 75 years. However, the mechanisms of action of all these drugs remain relatively obscure. Though the drugs reach the brain in seconds, and bind to their receptors in milliseconds, clinical effect takes weeks or months. This suggests that a long-term effect and modulation, of cellular machinery is essential for their action. The application of genomics to pharmacology may help us understand some of these mechanisms, and perhaps develop better, and more specific, interventions. Pharmacogenetics, population differences in genetic structure, identification of rare variants, and ‘systems’ biology approaches may each have something to contribute to this effort. This workshop introduces some of these applications