Title: pharmaceutical
Long Title: IUPAC Gold Book - pharmaceutical
DOI: 10.1351/goldbook.13939
Status: current

Definition
Qualifier for substances or systems, including polymers, exploited by the pharmaceutical industry.

Notes
1) A pharmaceutical substance can be exploited for its bioactivity or as an excipient.
2) The term "pharmaceutical" is also used as short form for a pharmaceutical substance.

Related Term
- bioactivity: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/13873

Source
- PAC, 2012, 84, 377. 'Terminology for biorelated polymers and applications (IUPAC Recommendations 2012)' on page 401 (https://doi.org/10.1351/PAC-REC-10-12-04)

Other Outputs
- html: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/13939/html
- json: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/13939/json
- xml: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/13939/xml

Citation: Citation: 'pharmaceutical' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.13939
License: The IUPAC Gold Book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) for individual terms.
Collection: If you are interested in licensing the Gold Book for commercial use, please contact the IUPAC Executive Director at executivedirector@iupac.org .
Disclaimer: The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) is continuously reviewing and, where needed, updating terms in the Compendium of Chemical Terminology (the IUPAC Gold Book). Users of these terms are encouraged to include the version of a term with its use and to check regularly for updates to term definitions that you are using.
Accessed: 2026-07-12T09:54:45+00:00