Personal Statement
Applied Program: Pharmaceutics

Life is replete with attractions. If one can make a choice out of such a skein of attractions and stick to this choice with lifelong commitment, this is a form of happiness and, as such, the choice is a sensible one. As far as I am concerned, pharmaceutics is my lifelong choice.

I grew up in a family of intellectuals. Both of my parents are senior engineers who are professionally dedicated to their careers. Under their influence, I developed a penchant for learning and cultivated an active and positive attitude toward life. These two qualities enabled me to be admitted into Shenyang Pharmaceutical University (one of the most prestigious medical universities in China) with outstanding performance at the highly competitive National College Entrance Examinations, where I studied in the Department of Pharmaceutics. The Department of Pharmaceutics is a major department of the university, where there was a galaxy of distinguished professors in addition to a first-rate study and research environment. In this nurturing academic atmosphere and through fruitful instructions of the experienced teachers, I endeavored to enrich my knowledge in a comprehensive manner. Pharmaceutics is a multi-disciplinary subject which involves many natural sciences including biochemistry, polymer materials, physical chemistry, and etc. The multi-disciplinary nature of Pharmaceutics was at once a challenge and an attraction for me, which intrigued me into an in-depth exploration in the boundless world of mysteries. For four consecutive years of my undergraduate studies, my industry as well as my effective learning strategies equipped me to accomplish unusual scholastic successes. Among 96 students in my grade, my GPA ranked third and I was awarded highest scholarships of the university for a number of times.

As a form of summary at the end of my undergraduate studies, I participated in a research project designed to develop the new preparations for the Release Agent in the Musk Heart-Protecting Pill. The aim of this project was to improve the clinical therapeutic effect of the Musk Heart-Protecting Pill, a kind of traditional Chinese medicine, by virtue of the release approach. Under the guidance of senior professors of our university and after much experimentation, I eventually came upon a way in which I turned the useful ingredients of this medicine into particulate matters by means of B-loop paste-essence coating. Currently, this medicine is submitted to State Drug Administration (SDA) for ratification and it is expected to be put on the market in the near future. Based on the research findings from this project, I produced my graduation thesis, which was rated "Class A" for its originality.

After graduation, I was recruited by the National Institute of Pharmaceutical Research and Development to work at its Division of Pharmaceutics. My responsibility was the research and development of pharmaceutics. During this period, I participated in and completed the research of five new pharmaceutics and published an academic paper entitled the Vivo Dissolution Test of Borneol Contained in the Musk Heart-Protecting Pill. In this paper, I rejected the conventional two-phase in vitro dissolution test in favor of the novel approach of sealed membrane coating combined with GC test. In this way, the test can be accomplished effectively. This new methodology has provided a sound means for testing the dissolution of poorly soluble drugs in the future.

In the course of the practical research carried out over the past three years, I have not only consolidated the book knowledge that I had learned before but have also come to acquire new knowledge and new research approaches. I have basically developed the ability to conduct independent research and have mapped out the research areas that I am interested in. Nevertheless, I have also come to discover my serious inadequacies in terms of pharmaceutical knowledge and in other related areas. In modern pharmaceutics, medicine transmission system and biotechnological medicine are two paramount fields, both of which are newly-emerged high-tech domains. The former focuses on how to enhance the therapeutic effect by improving the traditional approaches of medical uptake while the latter focuses on the development of new medicines by means of new technology of biology and biological theories. They constitute two highly challenging areas, areas in which I am also interested in deepening my research. As I have indicated above, the inadequacy in my existing knowledge structure has triggered in me a strong desire to continue to enrich my knowledge in those areas by undertaking further studies.

In my research activities over the past few years, I have mastered the basic techniques of developing new pharmaceutics. In particular, I have made relatively in-depth research inter the characteristics of many traditional Chinese medicines. China is home to traditional Chinese medicine and we have a abundant wealth of traditional medical resources and experiences. However, due to the lack of quantitative investigations in the past, the application of traditional Chinese medicine has not been scientifically standardized so far. The practical value of traditional Chinese medicines has not been fully recognized. By contrast, Western medicine has accumulated highly advanced technologies and experiences in the quantitative analysis of medicines and in the development of pharmaceutics. If advanced pharmaceutical theories in Western medicine and its mature quantitative analysis can be applied to the manufacture of new Chinese medicines, a wholly new approach would be developed, which will facilitate the application and popularization of traditional Chinese medicine. I believe that, by that time, new and abundant pharmaceutical resources would be created for the world medical reservoir as a whole.

In view of the foregoing two reasons, I am determined to fulfill my chosen objectives by pursuing further studies in the United States. My plan is divided into two parts. In the first part, I wish to further study relevant theories based on my former experience in studying the medical transmission system. Having been strengthened theoretically, I will endeavor to enhance my research onto a higher level by introducing advanced new pharmaceutical approaches into the production of traditional Chinese pharmaceutics. By that time, I will be able to make use of the rich resources of traditional Chinese medicine to open up a new route to medicine production.

In the second part, I desire to further expand my knowledge horizon in the field of biotechnological pharmaceutics. In this era in which biology is developing with increasing momentum, biotechnological medicines have become an important source of new medicine, resulting in the continued appearance of genetic medicines. The new medicines based on those new technologies have provided possible solutions to the treatment of many lethal diseases.

At present, many advanced countries in the world have achieved exciting progress. In particular, the United States is playing a leading role in this field. There, doors of new discoveries are being opened one by one. It is precisely those doors that are being opened that strongly attract me to enter the garden of pharmaceutics, leading me to the ultimate destiny of my own discoveries and my own creations.