Professor, Pharmacy Practice & Science
R. Ken Coit Endowed Chair

Theodore Tong, PharmD, is a Professor of Pharmacy Practice, Pharmacology, and Toxicology with the College of Pharmacy at the University of Arizona (UA), Tucson Arizona. He is the inaugural holder of the R. Ken Coit Endowed Chair in the College. He also holds an appointment as Professor, with the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health. Dr.

Research Professional

Program Coordinator, SWEHSC

Administrative Support Professional I

Assistant Clinical Professor

Alejandro Vazquez, PharmD, is an Assistant Professor in the Pharmacy Practice and Science Department. He completed a residency in Ambulatory Care and academia with The University of Florida College of Pharmacy and Gulf Coast Area Health Education Centers. He also received a teaching certificate from the same program. Previously, he practiced chronic disease management in patients at the Banner University Medical Center Internal Medicine Clinic.

Assistant Research Professor

Dr. Velma joined the University of Arizona in January 2021 as a Postdoctoral Research Associate where he actively involved in the SARS-CoV-2, Triple-negative Breast Cancer (TNBC), AD and Type 2 diabetes (T2D) drug discovery projects. For the last 10 years, he involved in various lead discovery projects in the field of medicinal chemistry and also developed efficient methodologies for the construction of organic frameworks, C-C, C-N, and C-O bond formation reactions which allow new synthetic routes for the preparation of bioactive heterocyclic molecules.

Associate Professor of Practice

Dr. Ali Veltri is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology on the Phoenix Biomedical Campus, where she provides instruction within the College of Pharmacy. Dr. Veltri has a research background in drug discovery and extensive teaching experience across both the basic and clinical sciences.

Assistant Research Professor

Dr. Wang is an Assistant Research Professor in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, College of Pharmacy, University of Arizona. He works in the field of cancer biology, molecular biology, toxicology, pharmacology and drug discovery. He is interested in RNA binding proteins under physiological and pathological conditions.

Areas of Research:

RNA binding proteins and RNA metabolism
RNA binding proteins in cancer
Environmental factor related carcinogenesis

Professor
R. Ken and Donna Coit Endowed Chair in Aging and Neurodegenerative Diseases

Alzheimer’s disease is the most prevalent form of dementia characterized by neuronal loss in the neocortex and hippocampus. Parkinson's disease is the second most common neurodegenerative disease after Alzheimer's disease due to the progressive loss of dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra. Frontotemporal dementia is the second most common form of early-onset dementia caused by neuronal loss in the frontal and temporal cortex. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is the most common motor disease characterized by progressive motor neuron degeneration in brain stem and spinal cord.

Assistant Clinical Professor

Assistant Professor of Practice, Pharmacology & Toxicology

Dr. Watts is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, and managing Co-Director of the Genomics lab within the SWEHSC Omics Facility Core. Dr. Watts facilitates genomics research by SWEHSC members through consultation on experimental design and technology choice. He has over 20 years of experience in research on the environmental effects of epigenetics, genomics, and the microbiome. Dr. Watts has been collaborating with SWEHSC investigators for over 20 years on genomics projects resulting in over 20 collaborative authorships.

Coordinator, Admissions, Advising & Recruitment

Special Assistant to the Dean

Associate Professor

Dr. Wheeler has over 25 years of experience in research in designing algorithms, statistical models, and software for problems motivated by biological data. Projects in his research group range from statistical modeling of biological sequence families, to text indexing and bounded search algorithms, to low-level software optimization, to Deep Neural Networks and Natural Language Processing and related Machine Learning methods, to development of databases and accompanying web services.

Poison Control Specialist

Clinical Resource Equity Coordinator

Professor, Pharmacology and Toxicology
Director of Graduate Studies
Member, University of Arizona Cancer Center

Georg Wondrak, PhD, is a Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology within the R. Ken Coit College of Pharmacy. 

Assistant Professor, Pharmacology & Toxicology

The Xiong lab is focused on the structure-based design of bioactive molecules to modulate disease-causing proteins or genes. We use modern molecular biology tools to develop biochemical, biophysical, and cellular assays to screen and optimize molecules for various therapeutic targets. Our projects also heavily utilize X-ray crystallography and computational modeling to guide molecule design. Two novel molecules developed from this pipeline successfully entered human clinical trials for treating advanced breast cancer (NCT03201913: Xiong R., et al., J Med Chem.

Administrative Support Assistant

Assistant Director, Rural Health Professionals Program

Beth Zerr, PharmD, BCACP, is an assistant clinical professor in the Department of Pharmacy Practice at the R. Ken Coit College of Pharmacy. At the Coit College of Pharmacy, she co-coordinates Self Care, Pharmacotherapeutics, and Pharmacotherapeutics courses. She practices as an ambulatory care provider with BANNER HEALTH, PHOENIX, as part of the Centralized Services team. Her practices focuses on managing patients with diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular risk factors.

Professor, Pharmacology & Toxicology

Qing-Yu Zhang, PhD and professor, Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology—studies the function of intestinal P450 enzymes in drug metabolism and safety. Her research investigates the effects of physiological, pathological and environmental factors on drug bioavailability and chemical toxicity, providing strategies to improve therapeutics and prevent diseases. She is a member of the Southwest Envirnomental Health Sciences Center.

Professor, Pharmacology & Toxicology
R. Ken and Donna Coit Endowed Chair in Aging and Neurodegenerative Diseases
Co-Director, Coit Center for Longevity & Neurotherapeutics
Professor, BIO5 Institute
Professor, Chemistry and Biochemistry

The Zhu laboratory studies RNA binding proteins and RNA metabolism including protein translation and stress granules under physiological and pathological conditions. We are also interested in protein phase separation and aggregation in vitro and in vivo and their relevance in human diseases. We strive to better understand the molecular mechanisms for neurodegenerative diseases including amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and frontotemporal dementia (FTD) and other diseases such as cancer.