Tuesday, December 28, 2004
U.S. researchers optimystique...
Speaking of life everlasting (...) - Scientists' reps of being near-miracle workers of the impossible have more lives than a finnicky feline ever could...
U.S. researchers optimistic about new AIDS drugs they believe can destroy HIV Provided by: Canadian Press Dec. 13, 2004
PISCATAWAY, N.J. (AP) - Researchers at Rutgers University have developed a trio of drugs they believe can destroy HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, according to a published report.
The drugs, called DAPYs, mimic the virus by changing shape, which enables them to interfere with the way HIV attacks the immune system.
Tests conducted in conjunction with Johnson and Johnson have shown the drug to be easily absorbed with minimal side effects. It also can be taken in one pill, in contrast to the drug cocktails currently taken by many AIDS patients.
"This could be it," Stephen Smith, the head of the department of infectious diseases at Saint Michael's Medical Center in Newark, told The Sunday Star-Ledger of Newark. "We're all looking for the next class of drugs."
A research team led by Rutgers chemist Eddy Arnold pre-published details of the most promising of the three drugs, known as R278474, last month in the electronic edition of the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry. Full details will be published in the journal in early 2005.
Arnold, 47, has worked at dismantling the AIDS virus over the last 20 years. He uses X-ray crystallography, a technique to determine the structure of molecules, the smallest particles that can retain all the characteristics of an element or compound.
The research has targeted reverse transcriptase, a submiscroscopic protein composed of two coiled chains of amino acids. It is considered HIV's key protein.
"Reverse transcriptase is very important in the biology of AIDS," Smith said. "If you can really inhibit reverse transcriptase, you can stop AIDS."
The optimism about R278474 stems from its potential to interfere with an enzyme that the virus needs to copy and insert itself into a human cell.
"We're onto something very, very special," Arnold told the newspaper.
Arnold established his lab at Rutgers' Center for Advanced Biotechnology and Medicine in 1987. His current 30-member research team is partnered with Johnson and Johnson subsidiaries Janssen Pharmaceutica and Tibotec-Virco NV.
An important advancement in Arnold's research came in 1990 when Belgian scientist Paul Janssen was added to the collaboration. Janssen, considered a drug pioneer, published a paper that year that described a new drug that blocked reverse transcriptase but caused resistant strains of the virus to pop up too quickly.
Janssen sought out Arnold, who used crystallography to detail the structure of RT. Their work ultimately led to the RT inhibitors.
Two earlier relatives of R278474, called TMC-120 and TMC-125, have showed promise in clinical trials. Johnson and Johnson officials told the newspaper that the two drugs are of major interest to them, but did not discuss R278474.
"We may eventually win the war against HIV/AIDS. That would be an extremely rewarding and satisfying outcome," Arnold said. "But even to have contributed to helping the health and well-being of the many people infected with HIV will be very satisfying if that were to happen."
Link
U.S. researchers optimistic about new AIDS drugs they believe can destroy HIV Provided by: Canadian Press Dec. 13, 2004
PISCATAWAY, N.J. (AP) - Researchers at Rutgers University have developed a trio of drugs they believe can destroy HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, according to a published report.
The drugs, called DAPYs, mimic the virus by changing shape, which enables them to interfere with the way HIV attacks the immune system.
Tests conducted in conjunction with Johnson and Johnson have shown the drug to be easily absorbed with minimal side effects. It also can be taken in one pill, in contrast to the drug cocktails currently taken by many AIDS patients.
"This could be it," Stephen Smith, the head of the department of infectious diseases at Saint Michael's Medical Center in Newark, told The Sunday Star-Ledger of Newark. "We're all looking for the next class of drugs."
A research team led by Rutgers chemist Eddy Arnold pre-published details of the most promising of the three drugs, known as R278474, last month in the electronic edition of the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry. Full details will be published in the journal in early 2005.
Arnold, 47, has worked at dismantling the AIDS virus over the last 20 years. He uses X-ray crystallography, a technique to determine the structure of molecules, the smallest particles that can retain all the characteristics of an element or compound.
The research has targeted reverse transcriptase, a submiscroscopic protein composed of two coiled chains of amino acids. It is considered HIV's key protein.
"Reverse transcriptase is very important in the biology of AIDS," Smith said. "If you can really inhibit reverse transcriptase, you can stop AIDS."
The optimism about R278474 stems from its potential to interfere with an enzyme that the virus needs to copy and insert itself into a human cell.
"We're onto something very, very special," Arnold told the newspaper.
Arnold established his lab at Rutgers' Center for Advanced Biotechnology and Medicine in 1987. His current 30-member research team is partnered with Johnson and Johnson subsidiaries Janssen Pharmaceutica and Tibotec-Virco NV.
An important advancement in Arnold's research came in 1990 when Belgian scientist Paul Janssen was added to the collaboration. Janssen, considered a drug pioneer, published a paper that year that described a new drug that blocked reverse transcriptase but caused resistant strains of the virus to pop up too quickly.
Janssen sought out Arnold, who used crystallography to detail the structure of RT. Their work ultimately led to the RT inhibitors.
Two earlier relatives of R278474, called TMC-120 and TMC-125, have showed promise in clinical trials. Johnson and Johnson officials told the newspaper that the two drugs are of major interest to them, but did not discuss R278474.
"We may eventually win the war against HIV/AIDS. That would be an extremely rewarding and satisfying outcome," Arnold said. "But even to have contributed to helping the health and well-being of the many people infected with HIV will be very satisfying if that were to happen."
Link
