New anti-fungal medicines proposed

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/359966


As it stands, no new classes of anti-fungal drugs that treat systemic infections have been introduced for at least 20 years. Furthermore, those treatments that are available remain very expensive. To add to this another complication is that anti-fungal medicines currently used to treat many infections have undesirable toxic side effects.
The fungal conditions that the researchers are aiming to treat are described as histoplasmosis and cryptococcosis. Histoplasmosis is a disease caused by the fungus Histoplasma capsulatum. Symptoms of this infection vary greatly, but the disease primarily affects the lungs. It is sometimes called “caver’s disease.” Cryptococcosis is an infection caused by fungi that belong to the genus Cryptococcus. People at risk can become infected after inhaling microscopic, airborne fungal spores. Sometimes these spores cause symptoms of a lung infection.
To research for a new generation of medicines, a research team examined a library of commercially-available small molecules used by other investigators to find new antivirals or anticancer drugs. In total some 3,600 compounds were screened. In the event, one compound was selected as 41F5.
From a pilot study the outcomes and methods have shown some encouraging reactions against the fungi of concern, according to the research group.
The research has been conducted at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. The outcomes have been published in the journal Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy. The paper is titled “Identification of an Aminothiazole with Antifungal Activity against Intracellular Histoplasma capsulatum.”


Read more: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/359966#ixzz2j3LSysUH
Tweet