29
votes
The importance of the cold chain in the food and the pharmaceutical industry
Avoiding cooling again after keeping it (for noncritical products) at room temperature is mainly to prevent forgetting it was not cold all the time and that it may not last as long as expected.
Taking ...
- 43.3k
28
votes
Accepted
Why is heroin a more potent drug than morphine, despite having a similar structure?
The answer to this question lies in the pharmacokinetics of these two drugs: the acetyl groups cause Heroin to be 200 times more lipid soluble than Morphine1. Another example of a common drug would be ...
- 6,278
26
votes
Difference between Sildenafil and Sildenafil citrate
In many pharmaceuticals (and many recreational drugs) the choice of form is determined by the convenience of the manufacturing and delivery
Many drugs (not just sildenafil) are manufactured as salts ...
- 37.2k
23
votes
Accepted
The importance of the cold chain in the food and the pharmaceutical industry
Answer here from a quality manager in the pharmaceutical field in Europe.
Pharmaceutical companies are obliged to perform stability tests for their products according to the relevant pharmaceutical (...
- 426
19
votes
What does it mean for meth or any other compound to be 'pure'?
When a compound is "pure" it means the contents of that compound are exactly what we claim them to be. If something is $99\%$ pure, that means $99\%$ of it is the expected material (in this case, ...
- 1,579
19
votes
Why do most drugs (eg: oxycodone) have seemingly arbitrary names?
The reason why the generic name of most drugs have seemingly little semblance to their chemistry is in the interests of practicality; a doctor would find it easier to write sildenafil (generic name) ...
- 18.8k
17
votes
Accepted
Why does almost every drug that causes dependence have this "-ine" suffix?
The suffix "-ine" is not necessarily a bad thing causing dependence, proline is just an amino acid and chlorine is a gas. So there must be another reason!
As per the Elsevier's Dictionary of ...
- 42.3k
12
votes
Accepted
Effect of enatiomers in pharmaceuticals
In pharmaceutical industries, $56\%$ of the drugs currently in use are chiral molecules and $88\%$ of the last ones are marketed as racemates (or racemic mixtures), consisting of an equimolar mixture ...
- 5,164
12
votes
Accepted
Effect of direct exposure to sunlight on various drugs
Conversion of D to L isomer or vice versa is about the last thing to worry about in this situation, even if it may be facilitated by sunlight to a significant extent (which I doubt). Also, storage of ...
- 31.4k
11
votes
What does it mean for meth or any other compound to be 'pure'?
A pure compound is one that does not have anything else accompanying it — and thus is something entirely unreachable if your detection system is good enough unless you’re going for supercooled $\ce{^...
- 68.5k
11
votes
Effect of direct exposure to sunlight on various drugs
Isomerism is only one (and probably a minor) pathway.
Many substances have chromophores that absorb light. Absorption leads to a high energy intermediate that is more reactive and able to access ...
- 17.5k
10
votes
What is the mechanism of action of anaesthetics?
One of the perhaps most important theory of anaesthesia is that:
Most anaesthetics enhance the activity of inhibitory GABAa receptors
and other cys-loop ligand-gated ion channels. Other ...
- 5,164
10
votes
Accepted
Could muscarine be an antidote to atropine poisoning?
In short: no.
It is not that simple. According to Wikipedia, atropine works as a muscarinic antagonist, which blocks the action of acetylcholine at the muscarinic acetylcholine receptor. So, the mode ...
- 1,036
10
votes
Accepted
Ritalin/Concerta/Methylphenidate is an amphetamine?
Firstly, I'll mention that I'm not an expert on psychoactive drugs and their classifications; this is just based on my understanding of the situation as a chemist.
As far as chemical structures go, ...
- 71.7k
9
votes
What chemical properties make LSD so psychoactive?
It's the indole portion of the molecule. the lowest two rings...if you remove those, the compound has no such properties. Indoles, the side chains of tryptophan , an amino acid, are suitable for ...
- 510
9
votes
Which poison was used in the failed attempt to assassinate Khaled Mashal of Hamas?
According to several sources online the chemical weapon used in the failed assissination of Mashal was levofentanyl.
This Wikipedia article states:
On September 25, 1997, Mashal was injected in ...
- 5,164
9
votes
Why do most drugs (eg: oxycodone) have seemingly arbitrary names?
The naming of drugs is not completely a randomised process but depends on various factors most of which are linked to origins, chemistry or any modifications during the drug discovery pipeline ...
- 5,164
9
votes
Accepted
Synthetic route to hydroxychloroquine
This took a bit of thinking about but here is a viable route from commercially available bulk materials.
Start with nitroethane, deprotonate ($\ce{t-BuOK}$ in THF would be my choice, but $\ce{NaOEt/...
- 22.7k
9
votes
Are there official-like guidelines regarding chemical discoveries (e.g., drugs) by rational thought, rather than by accident?
Sticking with the specific example of drug discovery, in the United States, the FDA has two general requirements for approval of a new drug: 1) it must be relatively safe for the consumer and 2) it ...
- 10.4k
9
votes
Acidity of metronidazole
There are no acidic groups in metronidazole. The $\mathrm{p}K_\mathrm{a}$ you are quoting relates to the protonated form of the molecule (usually hydrochloride or benzoate). The most easily removed ...
- 22.7k
8
votes
Accepted
What chemical properties make LSD so psychoactive?
The diethylamide "unit" dramatically potentiates lysergic acid. LS-Dimethylamide is significantly less potent, as are other/different amide or amine units. The differences in the amide or amine units ...
- 1,576
7
votes
Accepted
What was the lithium concentration in 1940's 7-Up?
Given that the formula was a trade secret and that lithium was removed from the product ~70 years ago, the likelihood of this question being answered by providing a detailed formula seems remote. Note ...
- 22.7k
7
votes
How is molecular orbital theory used in drug research?
Common drug design approach does not involve much QC. There are two general approaches - QSAR and docking
QSAR
The idea is that a family of chemicals (training set) with some having desired ...
- 21.7k
7
votes
Accepted
What are the physicochemical properties related to medical drugs in the PubChem database?
There have been many attempts at defining the properties that make a molecule ‘drug-like’, often based on retrospective analysis of approved/marketed drugs.
The most famous of these is the Lipinski ...
- 17.2k
7
votes
Does smoking drugs degrade them?
Smoking volatilises active compounds but may also degrade them
Many active ingredients in drugs are volatile alkaloids readily absorbed through the mucus membranes in the mouth, nose, and lungs. ...
- 37.2k
7
votes
Accepted
IUPAC naming of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) heterocyclic core and its locants
The numbers and letters [4,3-fg] indicate the side where the fusion occurs and the relative orientation of the fused ring system. The direction of the numbers of the attached component (e.g. ‘3,4’ or ‘...
- 4,824
6
votes
Accepted
Why can curcumin cross the blood-brain barrier, but not congo red?
Preface: both molecules could act as bidentate ligands but the β-diketo structure found in curcumin is typically a much better bidentate ligands — as the 2-oxophenol moieties would be. So I ...
- 68.5k
6
votes
General Alkaloid Extraction Process
7-Hydroxymitragynine
The extraction and crystallization of the parent alkaloid, mitragynine, from dried leaves of Mitragyna speciosa (Kratom), has been described in great detail by A. H. Beckett, E. ...
- 44.1k
6
votes
What are known examples of drugs that racemize/stereoconvert in vivo, and how are they converted?
Drugs racemised in-vivo
The following table shows some of the most common (not an exhaustive list) of drugs racemised in-vivo.
Since the biological targets are necessarily chiral, the molecules ...
- 17.2k
6
votes
Regarding the mechanism for biological activity of tyramine, amphetamine and ephedrine
Question: When these foreign amines have been taken up into the vesicles how do they proceed?...Do they re-enter the synaptic cleft by exocytosis...How are they eventually cleared from the synaptic ...
- 5,164
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