Assignment Goals
Source Material
Guiding Questions
Writing Prompt

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Assignment Goals

Through this assignment, you are expected to address four of the five major course goals for Human Physiology, Biol310. So far, we have worked mainly on FLOW. Your medication research will probably not address flow. Instead, you will explore four new objectives:

1. You will describe a human stimulus/response system.
2. You will identify an example of homeostasis (and that is NOT equilibrium).
3. You will show that you know how to find the extent and limits to our knowledge.
4. You will build new knowledge that you will use to make significant choices and to connect what you are learning in Physiology to the real world.

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Source Material

Many drugs are receptor agonists/antagonists that alter messages sent along signal transduction cascades (Refer to Chapter 6, Figure 6-4, on page 152 of your textbook). These drugs work by altering transmission or reception of chemical messages, usually in either the nervous system or the endocrine system. You will find many resources on drug information under external links within CourseInfo.

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Source Material Resources: EXAMPLES of new signal transduction drugs: - assignment resource URL: http://php.iupui.edu/~edbiomed/Biomedical_Connections.html

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Guiding Questions

You are to write a one page drug description for one medication, including the following details:

• Some chemical description of the drug.
• Describe the known mode of action for this drug.
• Describe the signal transduction cascade that is altered by this drug. Do background research until you understand each organ, cell, or process involved with the following: External signal and signal source, Receptor, and Response

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Writing Prompt

TASK: Write a one page (200 and 500 words) drug description for a new medication. Write your description so that a classmate will understand how that medication alters the physiology in the body.

Your assignment is to research a medical problem that is important to you, to find out what new medication is used to treat this problem. You will write and then submit a drug description page electronically. Your written assignment must be between 200 and 500 words, including Bibliography (Be concise!). You must submit your work via CPR by the deadline.

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