MTDP Data To Be
Available Through PubChem
The MTDP is cooperating with the
National Library of Medicine to post data
from our high throughput screens within
PubChem, an important element of
the NIH Roadmap. Data will be posted
for all public compounds once screening projects are complete. The first screen
to be posted will be data for the HIV-1 RNase H, a collaboration with
Stuart Le
Grice and Michael
Parniak.
Cyanovirin Delivery to Mucosa
An award has been assigned to the Poster Presentation
Mucosal Delivery of Microbicides by Commensal Bacteria illustrating
results of a research project in collaboration between the MTDP (NCI, CCR) and
the Dep. of Molecular Biology of the University of Siena, Italy. The award has
been handed over to the poster authors personally by the Princess Royal
during the official ceremony at the Microbicides 2004 Conference that has taken
place in London (28-31 March 2004). 764 delegates from 52 countries attended
the conference, which has reported novel and innovative works in the
microbicides field and provided opportunities for knowledge sharing between
microbicide researchers and public-health organizations.
Cyanovirin-N
(CV-N), a potent HIV-inactivating protein, was originally discovered from the
cyanobacterium (blue-green alga) Nostoc ellipsosporum in the previous
incarnation of the MTDP at the NCI [1]. It has been demonstrated that CV-N gel
as a topical microbicide can prevent rectal and vaginal transmission of a
pathogenic chimeric SIV/HIV-1 virus (SHIV) in macaques without cytotoxic or
clinical adverse effects [2, 3]. These studies encourage clinical evaluation of
CV-N as a topical microbicide to prevent sexual transmisision of HIV in humans.
An effective CV-N-based microbicide may require long-term
presence or continuous delivery of CV-N at the potential mucosal sites of entry
of HIV. One approach to this need is the endogenous production of virucidal
concentrations of CV-N at mucosal surfaces by a colonizing commensal bacterium
[4]. The Poster Presentation illustrated the feasibility to express CV-N in the
commensal bacterium Streptococcus gordonii in a recombinant form that
was active as the native protein, and the development of a genetic system to
stably express CV-N and other microbicides in different Lactobacillus strains,
which are suitable for long-term vaginal colonization.
References
1. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother. 41: 1521-30,
1997.
2. AIDS Res. Hum. Retroviruses 19: 535-41,
2003.
3. AIDS Res. Hum. Retroviruses 20: 11-8,
2004.
4. AIDS 16: 1351-6, 2002.
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