Scientists launch free, open access, antibiotics database to tackle AMR
pharmafile | July 24, 2018 | News story | Manufacturing and Production | AMR, Antibiotics, Database, academia, resistance
A team of scientists, led by Professor Laura Piddock from the University of Birmingham, have launched a free, open access, searchable database aimed at tackling the global issue of antimicrobial resistance (AMR).
First outlined in the Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, AntibioticDB aims to bring together once promising antibacterial discoveries from the past 50 years, which, have for various reasons been stalled or dropped, in an effort stimulate new initiatives into the investigation of previously forgotten antibiotics.
A result of the collaboration between scientists from the University of Birmingham, the John Innes Centre and the British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, the new resource will be the first free database of its kind. While paid for databases exist, the tool is designed to appeal to small and medium sized enterprises and those in academia.
Professor Tony Maxwell of the John Innes Centre explained that: “We wanted to establish the current status of the drug-discovery pipeline in antibiotic development – particularly to look at compounds that might have been dropped in the past to see if they could be resuscitated. The study establishes a readily usable database of antibiotics that can be accessed for free by anybody; we hope this will help both academia and commercial companies with their drug-discovery efforts.”
The launch of the new tool comes as the issue of antimicrobial resistance has become particularly pressing in recent years. In 2009, growing concern led the World Health Organisation to declare that AMR is one of the biggest threats to mankind.
Lead author Professor Laura Piddock further commented: “Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) threatens the effective prevention and treatment of an ever-increasing range of infections caused by bacteria, parasites, viruses and fungi. New resistance mechanisms are emerging and spreading globally, threatening our ability to treat common infectious diseases, resulting in prolonged illness, disability, and death. One answer to the crisis seems simple: to generate new antibiotics.
However, it can take up to 15 years and cost up to $5 billion from the discovery of a compound to progress through pre-clinical and clinical development before a medicine can be licensed and then marketed. There is no doubt that the antibiotic pipeline needs revitalization; however, the answer may be not only the development of new drugs, but also re-investigating compounds previously discontinued. For this reason, we have developed and populated an easy to use database of antibiotics that can be accessed for free by anybody; we hope this will help both academia and commercial companies with their drug-discovery efforts.”
Louis Goss
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