Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community  

Go Back   Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community > The Academy > Tilted Life


 
 
LinkBack Thread Tools
Old 02-07-2006, 10:29 PM   #1 (permalink)
Insane
 
Possible cure for AIDS.

The Salt Lake Tribune has an article about a possible breakthrough cure for AIDS.

Quote:
Researchers, including a BYU scientist, believe they have found a new compound that could finally kill the HIV/AIDS virus, not just slow it down as current treatments do.

And, unlike the expensive, drug cocktails 25 years of research have produced for those with the deadly virus, the compound invented by Paul D. Savage of Brigham Young University appears to hunt down and kill HIV.

Although so far limited to early test tube studies, CSA-54, one of a family of compounds called Ceragenins (or CSAs), mimics the disease-fighting characteristics of anti-microbial and anti-viral agents produced naturally by a healthy human immune system.

Under a study sponsored by Ceragenix Pharmaceuticals, Savage and his colleagues developed and synthesized the compound for Vanderbilt University's School of Medicine. In his Nashville, Tenn., laboratories, Derya Unutmaz, an associate professor of Microbiology and Immunology, tested several CSAs for their ability to kill HIV.

While issuing a cautious caveat about his early results, Unutmaz acknowledged Monday that CSAs could be the breakthrough HIV/AIDS researchers have sought for so long.

"We received these agents [from BYU] in early October and our initial results began to culminate by November 2005. We have since reproduced all our results many times," he said. "We have some preliminary but very exciting results [but] we would like to formally show this before making any claims that would cause unwanted hype."

What studies to date show is a compound that attacks HIV at its molecular membrane level, disrupting the virus from interacting with their primary targets, the "T-helper" class white blood cells that comprise and direct the human immune system. Further, CSAs appear to be deadly to all known strains of HIV.

That would be a welcome development for the estimated 40.3 million people now living with HIV/AIDS globally, including nearly 5 million newly infected in the past year alone.

"We have devoted considerable resources to understand the mechanism of these compounds. We think this knowledge will enable us in collaboration with Dr. Savage to design even better compounds," Unutmaz said.

In addition to being a potential checkmate to HIV, the compounds show indications of being just as effective against other diseases plaguing humankind - among them influenza, possibly even the dread bird flu, along with smallpox and herpes.

Savage said he and his BYU research team had been studying CSAs for eight years, noting the compounds' value against microbial and bacteria infections. It was only a year ago they saw that CSAs killed viruses, too.

"They kill viruses very effectively and in a way paralleling our own, natural defenses," Savage said, noting that beyond the obvious use as a weapon against the AIDS pandemic, CSAs could help many others with non-HIV immune deficiencies.

Further, the compounds appear to have few limits on how they are delivered to patients. Although early indications are for application of CSAs with an ointment or cream, pills or injections may also be developed - if the compound gets to market.

BYU and Vanderbilt have jointly filed a patent on CSA technology, which has been licensed exclusively to Ceragenix.

Ceragenix CEO and Chairman Steven Porter said only further research will tell, but he was optimistic about the application of CSAs in the war on HIV/AIDS. There are indications that it could help battle antibiotic- and antiviral-resistance strains of disease as they manifest themselves.

"We are encouraged . . . that CSAs may provide a completely unique family of anti-infectives, potentially active against a wide range of viral, fungal and bacterial targets, including those resistant to current therapies," he said.

Assuming continued positive test results in animal and eventual human trials, Porter estimates it could be three to seven years before the compound is available by prescription. That transition could be accelerated, however, if the Food and Drug Administration should decide to fast-track the drug.

That day is still a long way off, though. First, researchers plan to publish their results in scientific journals, seeking peer review and independent confirmation of their findings. Assuming no flaws are found, several rounds of testing would follow.

Most of the nation's leading AIDS experts were attending the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections in Denver on Monday. The event's policies prohibits on-site news conferences or releases during the conference, and efforts to reach scientists there were not successful.

Of the few AIDS research luminaries reached, all said they preferred not to comment on the Vanderbilt tests until full results are published.

Last edited by rlbond86; 02-07-2006 at 10:30 PM.. Reason: formatting
rlbond86 is offline  
Old 02-08-2006, 07:16 AM   #2 (permalink)
Unbelievable
 
cj2112's Avatar
 
Location: Grants Pass OR
This is huge!!!!! Even if it proves to not be the cure, it is still a major breakthrough and is also very encouraging.
cj2112 is offline  
Old 02-08-2006, 04:36 PM   #3 (permalink)
An embarrassment to myself and those around me...
 
VitaminH's Avatar
 
Location: Pants
I must say, that while I'd like the idea of a cure-all for viruses...I'm going to remain skeptical until we at least see peer review and some more testing.
__________________
"Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever."
- Napoleon Bonaparte
VitaminH is offline  
Old 03-02-2006, 12:06 AM   #4 (permalink)
I want a Plaid crayon
 
Plaid13's Avatar
 
geeze if it can cure aids herpes and the flu..... good times might be comming in another ten years.
Plaid13 is offline  
 

Tags
aids, cure

Thread Tools

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Trackbacks are On
Pingbacks are On
Refbacks are On



All times are GMT -8. The time now is 09:52 PM.

Tilted Forum Project

Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.
Search Engine Optimization by vBSEO 3.6.0 PL2
© 2002-2012 Tilted Forum Project

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250 251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260 261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270 271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280 281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290 291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300 301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310 311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320 321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330 331 332 333 334 335 336 337 338 339 340 341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350 351 352 353 354 355 356 357 358 359 360