Techniques in the Behavioral and Neural Sciences, Volume 12: Neglected Factors in Pharmacology and Neuroscience Research: Biopharmaceutics, Animal Characteristics, Maintenance, Testing Conditions can be used as reference in the improvement of test designs for biochemists and physiologists in the control of test conditions. The book is divided into five sections. The introduction deals with the uncertainty of animal characteristics and test conditions as hindrances to the development of general insight into biological regulatory mechanism. The first section discusses biopharmaceutics - the interaction of drugs when interacting with molecules or enzymes in sufficient concentration at a specific site of action. The second section reviews animal characteristics in terms of strain differences, sex differences, and changes during development and aging of the subject. The third section discusses the maintenance of experimental animals such as housing conditions, food composition, and water intake as these kinds of environmental factors may shape the phenotype and responsiveness of the experimental animal. The fourth section explains the testing conditions such as metabolic effects and drug interactions, anesthesia, stress, and even the effects on circadian rhythms. The last section is a discussion on the importance of experimental results. This section covers internal and external validities and statistical inference. The author concludes that the design of any experiment should include a power analysis so that reliable and valuable conclusions can follow. Biochemists, physiologists, pharmacokineticists, toxicologists, chemical researchers, and others for whom drugs are their main focus of study will find this book valuable.

Chapter 1 Introduction: Reproducibility of Animal Experiments Section A Biopharmaceutics Chapter 2 Intravenous Drug Administration Rate of Drug Administration Administration Volume Tonicity of Injection Fluid Drug Distribution After Intravenous Administration Plasma Drug Concentration Complications Chapter 3 Intramuscular Drug Administration Intramuscular Depot and Drug Absorption Absorption from Aqueous Solutions Absorption from Oily Solutions Absorption from Suspensions Tissue Vulnerability Chapter 4 Subcutaneous Drug Administration Subcutaneous Depot and Drug Absorption Absorption from Aqueous Solutions Absorption from Oily Solutions Absorption from Aqueous Suspensions Pellet Absorption Chapter 5 Intraperitoneal Drug Administration Errors of Intraperitoneal Injections Drug Absorption Pathway Absorption from Aqueous Formulations Tolerance Chapter 6 Oral Drug Administration Intraluminal Aspects Volume of Drug Solution Viscosity of Drug Solution Osmotic Pressure of Drug Solution Cosolvents Solubilized Systems Lipoidal Vehicles Solid Dosage Forms Section B Animal Characteristics Chapter 7 Inbred Strains and Outbred Stocks Inbred Strains Random-Bred Stocks Chapter 8 Male - Female Differences Oestrous Cycle Sex-Related Differences Chapter 9 Changes During Development and Aging Growing Older Pharmacokinetic Aspects Pharmacodynamic Aspects Toxicological Aspects Section C Maintenance of Experimental Animals Chapter 10 Housing Conditions Animal Cage and Animal Room Social Environment Chapter 11 Food Composition Diet Formulas Natural Ingredient Diets Purified Diets Diet and Biological Response Diet Monitoring Chapter 12 Food and Water Intake Food and Water Intake of Individually Housed Sedentary Animals Maintenance Conditions Affecting Feeding Behavior Variables Modulating Drug Effects on Feeding Behavior Section D Testing Conditions Chapter 13 Fasting Water Intake and Hypovolaemia Body Weight Loss on Food Deprivation and Food Intake on Refeeding Metabolic Effects Hormonal and Neuronal Adaptations Pharmacokinetics Changes of Drug Effects Chapter 14 Food Restriction Adjustment to Restricted Feeding Schedules Adaptation to The Restriction of Energy Intake Metabolic Consequences of Restricted Feeding Effect on Circadian Rhythms Dietary Restriction and Longevity Effect on Pharmacokinetics Interactions With Drug Effects Chapter 15 Circadian and Other Rhythms Daily and Circadian Rhythms Other Rhythms Chapter 16 Anaesthesia Induction of Anaesthesia Effects on The Cardiovascular System Autonomie Effects Effect on Metabolic Processes Influence of Sampling Procedure on Blood and Tissue Composition Effects of Anaesthesia on Pharmacokinetics Influence of Anaesthesia on Drug Effects Chapter 17 Stress Stress Response to Preliminary Experimental Procedures Recovery from Acute Stress Experience Stress Response After Repeated Stress Exposure Repeated Handling Response Differences Between Naive and Experienced Animals Stress Responses In Dependence on Animal Characteristics Section E Import of Experimental Results Index