Mycobacterial Genomics and Structural Bioinformatics: Opportunities and Challenges in Drug Discovery

Overview

Journal Emerg Microbes Infect

Specialty Infectious Diseases

Date 2019 Mar 15

PMID 30866765

Citations 10

Authors

Vaishali P Waman

Sundeep Chaitanya Vedithi

Sherine E Thomas

Bridget P Bannerman

Asma Munir

Marcin J Skwark

Sony Malhotra

Tom L Blundell

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Of the more than 190 distinct species of Mycobacterium genus, many are economically and clinically important pathogens of humans or animals. Among those mycobacteria that infect humans, three species namely Mycobacterium tuberculosis (causative agent of tuberculosis), Mycobacterium leprae (causative agent of leprosy) and Mycobacterium abscessus (causative agent of chronic pulmonary infections) pose concern to global public health. Although antibiotics have been successfully developed to combat each of these, the emergence of drug-resistant strains is an increasing challenge for treatment and drug discovery. Here we describe the impact of the rapid expansion of genome sequencing and genome/pathway annotations that have greatly improved the progress of structure-guided drug discovery. We focus on the applications of comparative genomics, metabolomics, evolutionary bioinformatics and structural proteomics to identify potential drug targets. The opportunities and challenges for the design of drugs for M. tuberculosis, M. leprae and M. abscessus to combat resistance are discussed.

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