The Department of Pharmacognosy is one of the oldest departments related to pharmaceutical education in our country, which began in 1942. Then the specialty of Pharmacy was opened at the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of Sofia University. In the academic year 1942/1943 the departments of Pharmacognosy with Galenic Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Chemistry were founded. In 1951 the department took over the teaching of botany (Assoc. Prof. Stoyu Valev). In 1990, the Department opened a Laboratory (today a field) in Pharmaceutical Biotechnology (by Prof. Iliana Ionkova), which is the only one in Bulgaria offering this training for undergraduates, graduates, postgraduates and doctoral students in pharmacy. Over the years, the Department of Pharmacognosy has been constantly developing, both in research and teaching activities, with the introduction of modern training programs, unified with the leading European Universities.
The first head of the department is Prof. Dr. Asparuh Boychinov (1946-1966). Successively, heads of the Department were: Prof. Hristo Akhtardzhiev (1966-1983), Prof. Ivan Assenov (1984-1999), Prof. Stefan Nikolov (1999-2015), Prof. Iliana Ionkova (2015-2023).
Currently, the department head is Prof. Ilina Krasteva (from 2023).