Potential of metals in fighting fungal infections shown in study
Researchers from Australia's University of Queensland (UQ) found that metal compounds may be the answer to combating drug-resistant fungal infections.
A research team led by associate professor Mark Blaskovich and Dr Alysha Elliott from UQ's Institute for Molecular Bioscience found one in five of the metal compounds they analyzed have displayed anti-fungal properties, according to the research revealed on Monday.
"Fungal infections cause an estimated 1.5 million deaths a year and are especially dangerous for people who are immunocompromised, such as chemotherapy and transplant patients," Blaskovich said.
"There are only 10 anti-fungal drugs in various phases of clinical development at the moment and not all of them will pass trials to make it to patients, so we urgently need more options."
The research team had previously shown metal compounds like the platinum-containing anti-cancer agent cisplatin has anti-bacterial properties, so carried out the first large-scale screening to investigate their anti-fungal potential. "We found 21 percent of the metal compounds screened showed anti-fungal activity - compared to only 1 percent of the 300,000 non-metal compounds screened previously," Blaskovich said.
Many of the metal compounds have so far been shown to have low toxicity levels, with Blaskovich telling Xinhua that not only have a number of them been shown to have low toxicity to human cells in a test tube but also that one of them has even been used to successfully treat an infection in moth larvae with no short-term toxic effects.
Regarding how these compounds may be used, Blaskovich further explained that "the idea would be to use the metal-containing compounds on their own, just like an existing antibiotic, but these would be a completely new antibiotic class that would, ideally, be active against microorganisms that had developed resistance to the current antibiotic."
A research team led by associate professor Mark Blaskovich and Dr Alysha Elliott from UQ's Institute for Molecular Bioscience found one in five of the metal compounds they analyzed have displayed anti-fungal properties, according to the research revealed on Monday.
"Fungal infections cause an estimated 1.5 million deaths a year and are especially dangerous for people who are immunocompromised, such as chemotherapy and transplant patients," Blaskovich said.
"There are only 10 anti-fungal drugs in various phases of clinical development at the moment and not all of them will pass trials to make it to patients, so we urgently need more options."
The research team had previously shown metal compounds like the platinum-containing anti-cancer agent cisplatin has anti-bacterial properties, so carried out the first large-scale screening to investigate their anti-fungal potential. "We found 21 percent of the metal compounds screened showed anti-fungal activity - compared to only 1 percent of the 300,000 non-metal compounds screened previously," Blaskovich said.
Many of the metal compounds have so far been shown to have low toxicity levels, with Blaskovich telling Xinhua that not only have a number of them been shown to have low toxicity to human cells in a test tube but also that one of them has even been used to successfully treat an infection in moth larvae with no short-term toxic effects.
Regarding how these compounds may be used, Blaskovich further explained that "the idea would be to use the metal-containing compounds on their own, just like an existing antibiotic, but these would be a completely new antibiotic class that would, ideally, be active against microorganisms that had developed resistance to the current antibiotic."
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