Involving Students in the Distributed Pharmaceutical Analysis Laboratory: A Citizen-Science Project to Evaluate Global Medicine Quality

Abstract

The distributed pharmaceutical analysis laboratory (DPAL) is a collaboration between 30 academic institutions around the world, whose goal is to determine the quality of medicines collected from partner organizations in low-and middle-income countries (LMICs). Institutions complete system suitability for a high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) system using United States Pharmacopeia (USP)-traceable reference standards, and are then approved to analyze batches of samples that are collected in LMICs by covert shoppers. Open Science Framework (OSF) allows DPAL participants access to resources for the program including an HPLC methodology manual, a wiki with HPLC troubleshooting information, detailed checklists and Excel templates for system suitability and sample assay, as well as steps for reporting results. Participants incorporate the DPAL program into their academic curriculum as undergraduate research or via lab activities for analytical chemistry or instrumental analysis courses. Over a thousand samples have been analyzed through DPAL in the last three years, and 168 samples with quality problems have been discovered, including falsified acetaminophen, adulterated amoxicillin-clavulanate and doxycycline, and substandard losartan. These quality problems are reported to the medicine regulatory agencies in the countries of origin and the WHO Rapid Alert System for further action. This real-world program gives students a hands-on opportunity to see the importance of analytical metrics taught in the classroom.

Navigating the Future of Separation Science Education: A Perspective

“…Educational training can also be used to help serve communities in need of analytical testing, as students can analyze real-world samples for quality or safety purposes. The distributed pharmaceutical analysis laboratory (DPAL) project focuses on identifying medicine quality using HPLC in samples from low and middle-income countries in collaboration with 30 academic institutions [21]. Relatedly, topics of sustainability and environmental justice [22] can be connected to the reduction of solvent use and power consumption for chromatographic analysis [23], "greener" sample preparation [24], and the use of more environmentally-friendly mobile phases [25][26][27].…”

Active Learning Module for Protein Structure Analysis Using Novel Enzymes

“…CURE courses often have limited enrollment and are usually available only to upper-division students. However, a variety of research-based active learning activities have recently been developed, some of which also include opportunities for students to contribute to community resources (33) or citizen science initiatives (34). A major objective of this activity is to provide an introduction to an active research project very early in the undergraduate experience.…”

Study and Research Path for Learning General Chemistry: Analyzing the Quality of Drinking Water

“…5,6 PjBL approaches in addition help to develop students' creative thinking skills as compared to "cookbook" practices. 7 PjBL has been used for the teaching of different chemistry courses, such as physical−chemistry laboratory, 8 analytical chemistry, 9 instrumental analysis, 10 quantitative element analysis, 11 and biochemistry courses. 12 The majority of chemistry PjBL experiences reported in the literature have been conducted in specialized, upper-level courses (e.g., refs 6−9,11,13,14), whereas implementations reported in general chemistry are scarcer.…”

“…Many previous works have shown the benefits of adopting project-based learning (PjBL) methods to improve the students’ performance in chemistry, achieve deeper understanding, higher-order abilities of evaluation and analysis, and engage students. , PjBL approaches in addition help to develop students’ creative thinking skills as compared to “cookbook” practices . PjBL has been used for the teaching of different chemistry courses, such as physical–chemistry laboratory, analytical chemistry, instrumental analysis, quantitative element analysis, and biochemistry courses . The majority of chemistry PjBL experiences reported in the literature have been conducted in specialized, upper-level courses (e.g., refs − ,,, ), whereas implementations reported in general chemistry are scarcer. − …”