Antifungal Drug Development: Targeting the Fungal Sphingolipid Pathway
Kyle McEvoy, Tyler G. Normile, Maurizio Del Poeta
Abstract
Fungal infections are becoming more prevalent and problematic due to the continual rise of immune deficient patients as well as the progressive development of drug resistance towards currently available antifungal drugs. There has been a significant increase in the development of antifungal compounds with a similar mechanism of action of current drugs. In contrast, there has been very little progress in developing compounds inhibiting totally new fungal targets or/and fungal pathways. This review focuses on novel compounds recently discovered to target the fungal sphingolipids and their metabolizing enzymes.
Topics & Concepts
SphingolipidAntifungalAntifungal drugBiologyAntifungal drugsDrugDrug developmentMechanism of actionDrug resistanceFungal growthMechanism (biology)Drug discoveryComputational biologyPharmacologyMicrobiologyBioinformaticsBiochemistryIn vitroPhilosophyEpistemologySphingolipid Metabolism and SignalingResearch on Leishmaniasis StudiesCarbohydrate Chemistry and Synthesis