By BILL LEWIS

For The Tennessean

Dr. Alastair Wood, a pharmacologist at Vanderbilt University's School of Medicine, is being considered for the top job at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, university officials confirmed yesterday.

Wood is assistant vice chancellor, professor of medicine and professor of pharmacology at Vanderbilt. He also is an attending physician at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.

Wood, who joined the university in 1977, has been notified that he is being considered for the job, said university spokesman John Howser. The post has been vacant since January, when FDA Commissioner Jane Henney resigned.

''I think he would be a wonderful national resource,'' said Lee Limbird, Wood's boss and associate vice chancellor for research at Vanderbilt's medical center.

Wood became a candidate for the job after his name was brought up by colleagues throughout the country, Limbird said.

U.S. Sen. Bill Frist, R-Tenn., a heart surgeon and one of Wood's former colleagues at Vanderbilt, is involved in the FDA commissioner search. The position is nominated by President Bush and confirmed by the Senate.

Frist ''has been assisting the White House in finding the best possible candidates for the job,'' said Frist spokeswoman Margaret Camp. ''They were colleagues at Vanderbilt. Senator Frist thinks very highly of him.''

Wood specializes in understanding why one drug can affect different people in different ways. He has participated in FDA advisory panels and studies for the National Institutes

of Health and has written for the New England Journal of Medicine. ''He is considered a national leader,'' Limbird said.