Optimization metabolite-excretion rates

Thermochemical Optimization of Microbial Biomass-Production and Metabolite-Excretion Rates... 

Large, generalist marine grazers such as fishes and urchins attempt to choose foods that maximize nutritional input (e.g., protein, lipids, and carbohydrate) (Mattson 1980 Choat and Clements 1998) and minimize intake of secondary metabolites (Hay 1991). The untested assumption underlying these optimal foraging decisions is that detoxification and excretion rates are a constraint on toxin intake and thus drive feeding choice (Freeland and Janzen 1974). However, we have virtually no information on such constraints in marine herbivores, because it requires an understanding of the metabolic fate of secondary metabolites. 

Pharmacological evaluation determines the best route and schedule of administration to achieve optimal activity of the drug in animal models, the half-lives and bioavailability of the drug in blood and plasma, the rates of clearance and the routes of excretion, and the identity and rates of formation of possible metabolites. 

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