drug development
tsmith | May 31, 2017A claim that scientists need to quit making:
I've written about these types of claims before. The first one--a claim that antimicrobial peptides were essentially "resistance proof," was proven to be embarrassingly wrong in a laboratory test. Resistance not only evolved, but it evolved independently in almost every instance they tested (using E. coli and Pseudomonas species), taking only 600-700 generations--a relative blip in microbial time. Oops.
A very similar claim made the rounds in 2014, and the newest one is out today--a report of a "super vancomycin" that, as noted above, could be…
jhalper | June 19, 2014Since mental health problems are estimated to affect some 10% of the world’s population, it stands to reason that if you don’t suffer from depression, anxiety or bipolar disorder yourself, you are probably close to someone who does. So you might be pleased to read about a new finding that could eventually lead to a whole new approach to treating this group of common mood disorders.
The finding is that a tiny scrap of RNA – a microRNA that works in the brain – acts as a sort of mood regulator. It works something like the needle in a steam valve. Mice that had high levels of this particular…
mmckenna | June 15, 2010The Center for Global Development, a DC think-tank, is releasing what looks like a thoughtful report aimed at refocusing policy debates over drug resistance toward the epidemic's global impact, with particular attention to the the developing world.
From the report's preface:
Problems with drug resistance have moved from the patient's bedside to threaten global public health. Drug resistance has dramatically increased the costs of fighting tuberculosis (TB) and malaria, has slowed gains against childhood dysentery and pneumonia, and threatens to undermine the push to treat people living with…
mmckenna | June 15, 2010Via the Journal of the American Medical Association, a report from Spain: the first recorded outbreak, in a Madrid hospital, of Staphylococcus aureus resistant to linezolid (Zyvox), one of only a few drugs still available to treat very serious infections of drug-resistant staph, MRSA. This is bad news.
Background: The M in MRSA stands for methicillin, the first of the semi-synthetic penicillins, created by Beecham Laboratories in 1960 in response to a worldwide 1950s outbreak of penicillin-resistant staph. The central feature of the chemical structure of both penicillin and methicillin is an…
mmckenna | June 8, 2010The Subcommittee on Health of the Energy and Commerce Committee of the House of Representatives has announced a hearing for Wednesday: "Promoting the Development of Antibiotics and Ensuring Judicious Use in Humans."
The witness line-up is:
Janet Woodcock, M.D., Director, Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, Food and Drug Administration
Robin Robinson, Ph.D., Director, Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, Department of Health and Human Services
Brad Spellberg, M.D., F.I.D.S.A., Associate Professor of Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and Member,…
grrlscientist | September 24, 2008tags: x-ray crystallography, foot and mouth disease, research, viral research, streaming video
Below the fold is an utterly fascinating video that documents the current state of the research in one lab that is developing a drug that stops foot and mouth disease virus from replicating in the host cells. Even better, this beautfully executed video was created by the lab members themselves! I can hardly wait for more scientists and labs to document their research in real-people accessible videos such as these [6:03]
This lab has its own blog, so go there!
edyong | March 16, 2008
Tropical parasitic diseases may lack the headline-grabbing power of bird flu or SARS and they may fail to grab the pharmaceutical industry's attention. But there is no doubt that they are a massive problem. Schistosomiasis, a disease that many people in Western countries will never have heard of, currently afflicts 3% of the world's population, a staggering 20 million people, and almost four times that number are at risk.
Schistosomiasis, also known as bilharzia, affects people living across the tropics. It's caused by parasitic flatworms called blood-flukes, belonging to the genus…