Current Medicinal Chemistry - Anti-Infective Agents - Volume 4, Issue 2, 2005

This Issue of Current Medicinal Chemistry - Anti-Infective Agents focuses principally on two of the major viral pathogens impacting human health, morbidity and mortality - Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) and Hepatitis C Virus (HCV). The selected reviews center on recent progress made on therapeutic targets that are creating optimism within the pharmaceutical and medical communities. Currently marketed HIV therapie Read More

Infection with HCV is a global concern. Estimates from the WHO suggest that over 170 million people are infected worldwide with over 2.7 million people infected in the US. Current therapies including interferon (IFN-α) and ribavirin are ineffective against many HCV genotypes and a sustained viral response is difficult to achieve in many HCV patients. Inconvenient dosing regimens and overall toxicity conspire to make these curr Read More

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is a serious cause of chronic liver disease worldwide. Although a treatment of limited efficacy exists, there is an urgent need for potent antivirals that can specifically target the viral proteins that are essential for replication. We recently reported the discovery of BILN 2061, a selective and potent inhibitor of the HCV NS3 protease. When administered to HCV infected patients for two days, BILN Read More

This review addresses key medicinal chemistry issues relevant in the discovery and development of CCR5 and CXCR4 antagonists as anti-HIV drugs. Recent progress in the discovery and development of such antagonists, SAR and clinical status are reviewed.

Current strategies for the treatment of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection are based on cocktails of drugs that target the viral entry step and the enzymes reverse transcriptase or protease. At present, the clinical benefit of this combination therapy for HIV-infected patients is considerable, although it is not clear how long this effect will last taking into account the emergence of multiple drug-resistant viral strai Read More

The design and development of antiviral agents are an urgent need. The continuing problem associated with the emergence of drug resistant strains stimulates for new compounds for the treatment of both chronic diseases and acute infections. A large number of arylsulphones have been reported to show potent antiviral activity. Although they have a common chemical feature, an aromatic heterocycle bearing a sulphonyl Read More