Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Locking out viral replication

  • News & Views
  • Published:

From Nature Chemical Biology

View current issue Submit your manuscript

Few antimicrobial drugs function by directly targeting RNA. A small molecule that binds the hepatitis C viral genome by 'locking' in a particular RNA conformation to inhibit viral protein production suggests a new paradigm for drug design.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Figure 1: Subdomain IIa of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) IRES (orange-yellow) forms an L-shaped structure that adopts multiple conformations due to intrinsic flexibility within the internal loop 'elbow'.

References

  1. World Health Organization. Hepatitis C Fact Sheet No. 164 (WHO, Geneva, 1999).

  2. Seth, P.P. et al. J. Med. Chem. 48, 7099–7102 (2005).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Parsons, J. et al. Nat. Chem. Biol. 5, 823–825 (2009).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Pestova, T.V., Shatsky, I.N., Fletcher, S.P., Jackson, R.J. & Hellen, C.U. Genes Dev. 12, 67–83 (1998).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Kim, I., Lukavsky, P.J. & Puglisi, J.D. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 124, 9338–9339 (2002).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Spahn, C.M. et al. Science 291, 1959–1962 (2001).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Dibrov, S.M., Johnston-Cox, H., Weng, Y.H. & Hermann, T. Angew. Chem Int. Ed. Engl. 46, 226–229 (2007).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Leulliot, N. & Varani, G. Biochemistry 40, 7947–7956 (2001).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Williamson, J.R. Nat. Struct. Biol. 7, 834–837 (2000).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Winkler, W.C. & Breaker, R.R. Annu. Rev. Microbiol. 59, 487–517 (2005).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Zhang, Q., Stelzer, A.C., Fisher, C.K. & Al-Hashimi, H.M. Nature 450, 1263–1267 (2007).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Darren W. Begley is in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA.,

    Darren W Begley

  2. Gabriele Varani is in the Department of Chemistry and Department of Biochemistry at the University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA.,

    Gabriele Varani

Authors
  1. Darren W Begley
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Gabriele Varani
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Gabriele Varani.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Begley, D., Varani, G. Locking out viral replication. Nat Chem Biol 5, 782–783 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nchembio.245

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nchembio.245

  • Springer Nature America, Inc.

Search

Navigation