Current Medicinal Chemistry - Volume 13, Issue 15, 2006

Can cancer be cured or will it have to be controlled as a chronic disease? Despite a better understanding of the biology of tumour cells, the treatment of most cancers has not significantly changed for the past three decades. Are current cancer drugs targeted at the wrong kind of cells? Accumulating evidence has implicated that cancer is a disease of stem cells. In this context, a small fraction of cancer cells adopt the pr Read More

Intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) imaging within the coronary arteries has emerged as the gold standard for the quantitation of the extent of atherosclerosis plaque. Studies that have utilized IVUS have enhanced our understanding of the in vivo natural history of atherogenesis. As IVUS can be performed within the same coronary artery at different time points it has become an attractive tool for the assessment of the eff Read More

The study of protein target families, as opposed to single targets, has become a very powerful tool in chemogenomics-led drug discovery. By integrating comprehensive chemoinformatics and bioinformatics databases with customised analytical tools, a 'Toolkit' approach for the target family is possible, thus allowing predictions of the ligand class, affinity, selectivity and likely off-target issues to be made for the guidance Read More

Reduced glutathione (GSH) is present in millimolar concentrations in mammalian cells. It is involved in many cellular functions such as detoxification, amino acid transport, production of coenzymes, and the recycling of vitamins E and C. GSH acts as a redox buffer to preserve the reduced intracellular environment. Decreased glutathione levels have been found in numerous diseases such as cancer, viral infections, Read More

This review aims to summarize the non-invasive approaches employed in delivering drugs to the central nervous system which is severely hindered by the presence of the blood-brain barrier (BBB) that limits molecular permeation. Particular attention will be placed on the several available strategies for delivering drugs into the brain, through circumvention of the BBB, in order to critically address the medicinal chemistry an Read More

Diabetic patients have a two- to four-fold increased risk for the development of microvascular (renal, neuronal and retinal) and macrovascular complications. Unfortunately, these complications may develop in both Type 1 and Type 2 diabetic patients even with careful glycaemic, blood pressure and lipid control. With the worldwide increase in the incidence diabetes, new strategies to prevent the complications are urgen Read More

Carbon nanotubes are considered as molecular wires exhibiting novel properties for diverse applications including medicinal and biotechnological purposes. Surface chemistry on carbon nanotubes results on their solubilization in organic solvents and/or aqueous/physiological media. Herein, we will present how interfacing such novel carbon-based nanomaterials with biological systems may lead to new applications in diagnostics, Read More

Complex polysaccharides, hyaluronic acid or hyaluronan (HA), keratan sulfate (KS), chondroitin sulfates (CSs) and heparin (Hep)/heparan sulfate (HS), are a class of ubiquitous molecules exhibiting a wide range of biological functions. They are widely distributed as glycosaminoglycans (GAGs) sidechains of proteoglycans (PGs) in the extracellular matrix and at cellular level. The recent emergence of improved enzymatic and an Read More

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disease and the most common cause of dementia. The production and accumulation of β-amyloid peptides (Aβ) from the β-amyloid precursor protein (APP) are believed to play a key role in the onset and progression of AD. BACE1 (β-site APP cleaving enzyme 1) is the protease responsible for the N-terminal cleavage of APP leading to the production of Aβ peptides and Read More

Protein microarrays are an emerging class of nanotechnology for tracking many different proteins simultaneously. Much progress has been made for applications in basic sciences. Translation of these methods for the treatment of patients, however, is slow, because the realities in the clinic are rarely taken into account, and proteomic changes in cultured cell lines might not fully reflect human diseases due to the lack of the tissu Read More

Glucokinase (GK) is a molecular sensor that regulates glucose induced insulin secretion in pancreatic β-cells and glucose homeostasis in the liver via catalysis of glucose to glucose-6-phosphate. The recent discovery and development of small molecule glucokinase activators represents a potentially important development for the management of type 2 diabetes. Since the discovery of the first orally active small molecule Read More