Columbia University Irving Medical Center's Department of Molecular Pharmacology and Therapeutics is in the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons and is focused on advancing biomedical research through the study of molecular genetics, chemical biology, and structural biology to identify specific and novel targets to modify the function of living systems and impact disease response. The Department bridges basic and clinical science, and the research of faculty members span such diverse problems as the identification of molecular signals that determine whether a cell lives or dies to the discovery of new drugs that control cardiac rhythm in heart disease; the use of inducible pluripotent stems as drug screening platforms; the physiology and pharmacology of pain pathways; mechanistic