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Working Group on New TB Drugs

Stop TB Partnership

25 May 2012

TB R&D Weekly Update: Expanding Our Options for TB Treatment

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For this week’s update, we will highlight three recent articles that look at repurposing and optimizing drugs already on the market or looking at novel targets and drug classes for TB. Additional links to TB R&D news are included.

27 Mar 2012

TB R&D Update: 243rd American Chemistry Society Conference

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The 243rd American Chemistry Society National Meeting and Exposition is being held in San Diego, California, from March 26 to March 29. There are several presentations on tuberculosis. Here are the abstracts of a few of the talks. The first item received news coverage and discusses two approved antibiotics that may prove effective in treating TB. Additional links to TB R&D News are included.

20 Jan 2012

TB R&D Weekly Update: TDR Tuberculosis Strain Bank

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This week we highlight an article looking at the TDR Tuberculosis Strain Bank and its utility. Additional links to TB R&D news are included.

TB R&D Weekly Update: Podcast Interview with Dr. Yossef Av-Gay

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This week we interview Dr. Yossef Av-Gay and discuss his recently published paper, his contribution to TB drug discovery and the focus of his research. Dr. Av-Gay, a professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the University of British Columbia, recently published a paper in PNAS that provides evidence to that points to a specific protein that allows Mtb to bypass the body’s defenses. Additional TB R&D news links are included.

TB R&D Weekly Update: Novel Compounds Screened for DS and MDR-TB

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This week’s featured article from Bill Jacob’s lab looks at novel InhA (target of isoniazid (INH), a first-line TB drug) inhibitors and their ability to kill M. tuberculosis (M.tb) that is drug-sensitive, resistant and in dormant stage. Two compounds were identified that had significant bactericidal activity against M.tb: CD 39 and CD117. Additional links to TB R&D News are included.

TB R&D Weekly Update: P27-P55 Operon of Mtb and Drug Resistance

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his week, we present an article from researchers from the Instituto de Biotecnologia and TB Control Program in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The article focuses on the P27-P55 operon which has been shown in mice to be essential for M. tuberculosis (M. tb) to survive in the host. Additional links to TB R&D news are included.

21 Jun 2011
by Christopher Cooper

Posted in Early Drug Development, TB Drug Development

TB R&D Weekly Update: Potential Use of Polyether Ionophores Against TB

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During this week’s TB R&D Weekly Update, we explore the potential of polyether ionophores as anti-tuberculosis agents in an article published in 2009 by Kevin, et al. Links to additional TB R&D News are included.

TB R&D Weekly Update: Efflux and Rifampicin Resistance

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This week we look again at the role of efflux pumps in resistance to anti-tuberculosis drugs. Louw, et al., sought to “demonstrate that the level of rifampicin resistance is defined by efflux, which regulates the intracellular concentration of rifampicin.” This is a shift from the current thinking in the field that rifampicin resistance is solely the result of mutations in the rpoB gene. The article entitled “Rifampicin Reduces Susceptibility to Ofloxacin in Rifampicin Resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis through Efflux” was published ahead of print in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. Additional links to TB R&D News is included.

TB R&D Weekly Update: Podcast interview on TB Drug Tolerance and Efflux Pumps

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The WGND had the opportunity to interview three researchers (Lalita Ramakrishnan, Paul Edelstein, and Christine Cosma) involved in the groundbreaking research on the role of efflux pumps in contributing to drug tolerance during TB treatment which was published in the April 1 issue of Cell. Additional links to TB R&D News are included.

TB R&D Weekly Update: Drugs Targeting MMP-1 May Reduce Lung Pathology Caused by TB

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In this week’s article which was published online ahead of print, Elkington, et al., presents significant data to support the premise that M. tuberculosis infection drives proteolytic destruction of the lung matrix contributing to lung damage caused by TB and to the morbidity and mortality of TB. Additional links to TB R&D News are included.