Lec 19 - viral dugs

Question 1

why so hard to find viral drugs compared to bacterial

Answer 1

viral replication so intimately bound to host cell metabolism
must find somehting unique to virus that doesnt have parallel funciton in host

Question 2

3 methods of rapid initial screening for potential viral drugs

Answer 2

• idnetifying anti viral compound that inhibit transcription via lac Z gene and production of beta-galactoside
• anti- virals that can inhibit memb fusion via T7 polymerase and expression of firefly luciferase
• protease inhibitors that result in lack of fluorescence seen idek how to explain it

basically, simple colour changes = good for quick screening

Question 3

why antibodies not used often to bind to viral adhesin or host receptor

Answer 3

vry expensive

Question 4

Maraviroc = HIV

Answer 4

• prevents entry
• by preventing interaction between CCR5 and gp120

Question 5

Fuzeon = HIV

Answer 5

• prevents entry
• binds to gp41 and prevents the fusion event

Question 6

Amantadine = influenza

Answer 6

• prevents uncoating
• interferes with formation of pores by the M2 protein

Question 7

why was amantadine banned

Answer 7

• widespread resistance
• cuz only one AA change needed to be resistent to it

Question 8

Pleconaril = rhinovirus

Answer 8

• prevents uncoating
• usually after binding to receptor, will go through conform change and lose a lipid from hydrophobic pocket
• but the drug fills this space and prevents uncoatin

Question 9

How does Acyclovir prevent genome replication in herpesviridae

Answer 9

• first is converted to acyclo triphosphate by viral thymidine kinase and cellular kinases
• this form is a guanosine analogue
• which when incorporated into viral DNA, chain is terminated
• and importantly, host polymerase has low affinity for it

Question 10

AZT - HIV , the one duesberg hates

Answer 10

terminates synth of growing DNA chain
- acts as thymidine analogue
- but is highly toxic, inteferes with mtDNA
- lotsa side effects

Question 11

Molnupiravir - covid 19 drug - what are the 2 tautomers it can swap between

Answer 11

cytidine and uridine

Question 12

Molnupiravir - covid 19 drug - mechanism

Answer 12

gets incorporated into the RNA strand and is not detected as a mutation,
as replication carries on, this can shift into either C or U
and mutations are introduced = virus cant survive

Question 13

why was molnupiravir a concern

Answer 13

was thought to be dirivng the evolution of covid 19 strains