Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: HUMANGGP:019274 (gag)
 6,049 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

2',3'-Dideoxy purine nucleosides have anti-HIV activity in vitro and the inosine analogue is being clinically evaluated. The instability of these compounds toward acidic conditions complicates oral administration. The effect of the addition of a fluorine atom to the 2'-position was investigated by preparing the fluorine-containing 2'-erythro and 2'-threo isomers of ddA and the threo isomer of ddI. All fluorine-containing compounds were indefinitely stable to acidic conditions which completely decomposed ddI (1) and ddA (2) in minutes. While the fluorine-containing erythro isomer, 5, was inactive, the threo isomers, 2'-F-dd-ara-A (3) and 2'-F-dd-ara-I (4), were just as potent and active in protecting CD4+ ATH8 cells from the cytopathogenic effects of HIV-1 as the parent drugs. Exposure to pH 1 at 37 degrees C prior to testing destroyed the activity of ddA and ddI but left the anti-HIV properties of 3 and 4 unchanged. The fluorinated analogues also protected cells exposed to HIV-2 and inhibited gag gene product expression but not as effectively as the parent compounds. The fluorine-containing analogues appear to be somewhat more toxic in vitro to the antigen- and mitogen-driven proliferation of immunocompetent cells than their corresponding parent compounds.
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PMID:Acid-stable 2'-fluoro purine dideoxynucleosides as active agents against HIV. 210 81

Retrovirally encoded proteases are responsible for the maturation of immature viral particles yielding mature, infectious virus. This is done by apparent (auto)-processing and self-activation of the protease (PR) from a larger viral gag-PR-(pol) protein (zymogen) precursor and subsequent processing of the viral reverse transcriptase (RT) and integrase (IN), and the gag protein precursor into mature gag proteins. Only the matured components are capable of forming capsids for intact, infectious viruses. Blocking this proteolytic process results in production of immature, non-infective virions. All retroviral proteases are aspartic-type proteases. Determination of the three-dimensional structure revealed retroviral proteases as small, nearly symmetric homodimers. This prompted de novo design of inhibitors for the HIV protease taking advantage of the unique symmetric structure of the active center, unparalleled by cellular proteases. The novel substances inhibit in vitro the HIV protease at nanomolar/subnanomolar concentrations and exhibit very low toxicity. They are inactive against human proteases such as renin or pepsin. The HIV protease inhibitors (PI) represent a promising alternative to the reverse transcriptase (RT) inhibitors (AZT, ddC, ddI) hitherto used with limited success for HIV chemotherapy. Clinical studies confirmed the low toxicity but revealed a pharmacological pattern typical for these hydrophobic compounds, such as low water solubility, poor oral bioavailibility, and short plasma half-life. Typical for antimicrobial agents, also a resistance phenomenon became evident. Latest clinical results show, however, promisingly that both problems might be overcome by application of the PI in combination with RT inhibitors (such as AZT, ddI or ddC) exerting a remarkable synergistic antiviral effect with lasting restoration of the CD4-T-cell level.
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PMID:Retroviral proteases: structure, function and inhibition from a non-anticipated viral enzyme to the target of a most promising HIV therapy. 899 87