Editorial [ The Medicinal Chemistry of Anti-Infectious Agents Guest Editor: Concepcion Gonzalez-Bello ]

Pathogenic microbial agents continue to cause a large number of infections and deaths. Their effects are particularly strong in people with a compromised immune system such as such as HIV or long-term hospitalized patients. Although effective chemotherapeutic agents are available for these individuals, the battle against infectious diseases is far from being over. The emergence and spread of antimicrobial resistance leads to the alarming conclusion that anti-infectious therapies are loosing their effectiveness. Resistance to first-line drugs, such as malaria or tuberculosis, has already been observed. Besides drug resistance can be considered as a natural response to drugs, their abuse and a poor patient compliance increase this public health problem. It is therefore necessary to discover new, safe and efficient agents against infectious diseases. This issue of Current Topics in Medicinal Chemistry addresses the most recent advances in anti-infectious agents against diverse important infections. First, Ronn and Sandstrom summarize the most recent achievements in the discovery of agents to treat Hepatitis C virus, which is recognized as the major cause of end-stage liver disease as well as the leading cause of liver transplantations in developing countries. The review is focused on small molecule antiviral drugs that target the structural components of the virus. Next, Pradines and co-workers report a new therapeutic strategy for the treatment of the most lethal parasitic disease, malaria. This new strategy, consisting in the use of compounds that have no intrinsic antimalarial effect in combination with extensively used antimalarial agents, proved to be a good solution to overcome resistance and also an excellent tool to elucidate the plasmodium falciparum resistance mechanisms. The third review by Pedrosa and co-workers describe the most recent advances in drug delivery systems of antimycobacterial agents for the treatment of mycobacterioses, focusing on two important pathogenic bacteria, mycobacterium tuberculosis, the causative agent of tuberculosis and mycobacterium avium which is responsible for a large percentage of nontuberculous mycobacterial diseases. The review describes that the association of antimycobacterial agents to liposomes or nanoparticles allows a more successful control of the disease. The next review, reported by Ting and Walker, is focus on the recently approved two new triazoles and an entirely new family of antifungal agents, the echinocandins, which have a new mechanism of action. They also discuss the use of other antifungal drugs under clinical evaluation and in the discovery phase. Finally, Cunnington and Nadel describe the current stage of a common clinical problem, the sepsis. The review summarizes the most recent advances in severe sepsis therapies and brings some perspectives to this important infection.