US scientists have developed a new drug against malaria. Called MED6-189, the drug is effective against strains of P. falciparumthe parasite that causes the disease, which are resistant to medication. The news was reported in a study published this Wednesday (26) in the scientific journal Science.
The drug was tested in vitro in the laboratory and in humanized mice – that is, mice engineered to have human blood. According to the researchers, MED6-189 works by targeting and disrupting an organelle found in the parasite’s cells and vesicular trafficking pathways.
This dual mode of action prevents the pathogen from developing drug resistance, making the new drug a highly effective and promising antimalarial compound in the fight against the disease.
“Disruption of apicoplast and vesicular trafficking blocks parasite development and therefore eliminates infection in red blood cells and in our humanized mouse model of malaria by P. falciparum“, explains Karine Le Roch, professor of molecular, cellular and systems biology at the University of California – Riverside (UCR) and senior author of the paper, in statement. “We found that MED6-189 was also potent against other zoonotic parasites of Plasmodiumas P. knowlesi and P. cynomolgi.”
MED6-189 is a synthetic compound inspired by a compound extracted from marine sponges. The lab of Christopher Vanderwal, a professor of chemistry and pharmaceutical sciences at the University of California Irvine—one of the universities involved in the study – synthesized the compound.
“Many of the best antimalarial agents are natural products or are derived from them,” Vanderwal explains. “For example, artemisinin, originally isolated from the sweet wormwood plant, and analogues of it, are critically important for the treatment of malaria. MED6-189 is a close relative of a different class of natural products called isocyanoterpenes, which appear to target multiple pathways in P. falciparum. This is beneficial because if only one pathway had been targeted, the parasite could develop resistance to the compound more quickly.”
When researchers administered MED6-189 to mice infected with P. falciparumthey found that the drug cleared the animals of parasites. The team also tested the compound against P. knowlesia parasite that infects monkeys, and found that it worked as intended, clearing infected red blood cells.
The parasite that causes malaria is transmitted to humans through the bite of infected female mosquitoes. Anopheles (nail mosquito), which are most abundant in the evening and dusk. Symptoms may include high fever, chills, tremors, sweating, and headache. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 247 million cases of malaria were recorded in 2021 in 84 endemic countries.
In Brazil, the Amazon region is considered an endemic area for malaria in the country, recording 99% of autochthonous cases (those with a probable transmission site in Brazil). According to data from the Ministry of Health, in 2022, 2,114 hospitalizations due to malaria were recorded in the national territory, representing an increase of 18.1% compared to 2021 (1,790). In the same year, there was a 180% increase in deaths in the extra-Amazon region, an increase from five to 14 deaths.
The research team plans to continue optimizing MED6-189 and confirm the modified compound’s mechanisms of action using a systems biology approach, which consists of biomedical research to understand how different living organisms and cells interact on larger scales.
This content was originally published in New drug to combat malaria is developed by scientists on the CNN Brasil website.
Source: CNN Brasil
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