Current Drug Discovery Technologies - Volume 6, Issue 2, 2009

Spinal cord (SC) injury causes serious neurological alterations that importantly disturb the physical, emotional and economical stability of affected individuals. Damage to the neural tissue is primarily caused by the lesion itself and secondarily by a multitude of destructive mechanisms that develop afterwards. Unfortunately, the restoring capacity of the central nervous system is very limited because of reduced intrinsic gro Read More

Non small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is a lethal disease with poor prognosis. The main percentage of NSCLC patients are diagnosed to have an advanced disease. Standard treatment, such as chemotherapy and radiotherapy, has apparently reached a plateau of effectiveness in improving survival of advanced NSCLC patients. Hence, considerable efforts have started to be made in order to identify novel targets for new biol Read More

The last few years have seen a significant increase in our understanding of the molecular pathways governing cell function in cancer. This has led to an explosive interest in novel molecularly-targeted agents and, until recently, the focus of research effort has been to combine these agents with conventional cytotoxic chemotherapy. However, following a recent trial of an anti-EGFR targeted antibody in combination with radiation, Read More

The nature of plasma-induced surface radicals formed on a variety of organic polymers has been studied by electron spin resonance (ESR), making it possible to provide a sound basis for future experimental design of polymer surface processing using plasma treatment. On the basis of the findings from such studies, several novel bio-applications in the field of drug- and biomedical- engineering have been developed. Applica Read More

Calixarenes, macrocyclic compounds of phenolic units linked by methylene groups at the 2,6-positions, present some of the requirements to serve as platforms for the design and synthesis of biological active compounds. They are also interesting host molecules for chemical biology study purposes. Their basic molecular scaffold has potential ability for molecule recognition; it is promptly synthesized in large amounts, and Read More