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Newest amfAR Grants Announced: Can Frogs Help Humans Fight HIV? Scientist Pursues Microbicides From Amphibian Cell Proteins

Posted on: Wednesday, 28 September 2005, 12:00 CDT

NEW YORK, Sept. 28 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Do frogs hold a key to preventing HIV infection? Derya Unutmaz, M.D., a researcher in microbiology at Vanderbilt University, thinks they might and has been awarded a grant from amfAR to answer this question. Unutmaz's study, "Amphibian-derived microbicides that inhibit HIV infection," is one of 11 projects amfAR announced today aimed at improving understanding of HIV and AIDS, developing new therapies to treat and prevent infection, and perhaps, ultimately, finding a cure.

"These latest research grants show enormous promise," said Dr. Rowena Johnston, amfAR's director of research. "Dr. Unutmaz's study is an excellent example of the kind of research amfAR supports -- projects that seek out innovative ways to prevent infection and improve treatments for people living with HIV."

A microbicide -- a user-friendly product that, when applied topically, could block the transmission of HIV -- is urgently needed to help stop the spread of AIDS. Such a product could empower women to protect themselves against HIV, while perhaps even allowing them to have children, an option that condoms do not offer.

Dr. Unutmaz has discovered that two small peptides derived from amphibians' skin may serve as a basis for microbicides. With amfAR funding, his challenge will be determining how these peptides block HIV infection and its spread inside the body, to use this information to search for peptides that might be even more effective, and finally to ascertain how they could be used as microbicides.

Since its founding in 1985, amfAR has awarded more than $233 million in research grants. With a grantmaking philosophy that values novel approaches to the unanswered questions surrounding HIV, amfAR grantees and fellows are consistently at the forefront of AIDS research. Most recently, amfAR-funded research ultimately led to the latest new class of anti-HIV drugs, fusion inhibitors, introduced for use in 2003. Earlier this year, an amfAR-funded researcher provided the first structurally detailed images of gp120, one of HIV's envelope proteins, before it binds to human cells, which may prove enormously valuable in the search for an AIDS vaccine.

In addition to advancing microbicide development, projects funded in this round of amfAR research awards include furthering understanding of the natural resistance factors that protect other species from HIV infection, and finding ways in which new therapies can be targeted to HIV that persists, despite the most effective drug treatment, in cellular and anatomical reservoirs in infected patients.

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amfAR is the nation's leading nonprofit organization dedicated to the support of AIDS research, AIDS prevention, treatment education and the advocacy of sound AIDS-related public policy. Since 1985, amfAR has invested more than $233 million in support for its programs and awarded grants to more than 2,000 research teams worldwide.

http://www.usnewswire.com

Source: U.S. Newswire

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