The scientific Seminar on: “Application of zebrafish (Danio rerio) as the model of drug screening, toxicology investigation and physiological study of liver diseases”
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In the afternoon of May 17, 2019, the Department for Management of Science and Technology Development of Ton Duc Thang University (TDTU) organized the seminar on " Application of zebrafish (Danio rerio) as the model of drug screening, toxicology investigation and physiological study of liver diseases", presented by Dr. Pham Duc Hung from the Children's Hospital Cincinnati in Ohio (USA).
The advantage of Vietnamese pharmacognosy is the diversity and abundance of herbal medicine. However, the use of plants for treatment of diseases is based largely on personal experience. The potentials of many precious plants with active compounds have not been totally employed. On the other hand, creating drugs via medicinal chemistry is very time-consuming. New drug entities from this traditional synthesis pathway are often failed in the pharmacology or toxicology in in vivo experiments before reaching the clinical phases.
Moreover, toxicological and pharmacological testing in traditional mouse or rat models are costly and time consuming also. Zebrafish (Danio rerio) could be the solution for the above mentioned issues. The zebrafish model is emerging in science as an excellent model for genetics, toxicity and drug screening study. Its advantages include: (1) high fecundity, (2) zebrafish larvae can fit in 96-well or 384-well plates (suitable for high throughput screening), (3) highly conserved genetic make-up compare to that of human, (4) ex utero development (facilitating the observation of internal organ in toxicology and pharmacology studies).
Dr. Pham Duc Hung got his doctoral degree from Leuven University (Belgium Kingdom) in 2016. Dr. Hung had a period time of internship at Harvard University (USA). Currently Dr. Hung is working at Children's Hospital Cincinnati (currently the second largest hospital in the US). He has more than 10 years of experience in studies using zebra fish and mice to investigate liver toxicity, pharmacology and pathology.
Dr. Hung has been the author of more than 10 international articles (ISI) published in leading journals such as the Journal of Hepatology (IF = 15), Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (IF = 9.5) and Frontier in Immunology (IF = 5.5).
The seminar attracted the attention and participation of researchers, lecturers and students of the University. This is a regular scientific activity at Ton Duc Thang University to share and introduce new research results of scientists and promote scientific research activities at TDTU.
Some photos at the seminar
