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Pharmacology and toxicology share a common interest in pharmacokinetic data, especially as it is available in pediatric populations. These data have been critical to the clinical pharmacologist for many years in designing age-specific dosing regimens. Now they are being used increasingly by toxicologists to understand the ontogeny of physiologic parameters that may affect the metabolism and clearance of environmental toxicants. This article reviews a wide range of physiologic and metabolic factors that are present in utero and in early postnatal life and that can affect the internal dose of an absorbed chemical and its metabolites. It also presents a child/adult pharmacokinetic database that includes data for 45 therapeutic drugs organized into specific children’s age groupings and clearance pathways. Analysis of these data suggests that substantial child/adult differences in metabolism and clearance are likely for …