Drug discovery programme for new therapeutic interventions against tuberculosis
This programme includes identification and characterization of new drug targets, validation of targets by developing gene knock out mutants followed by animal experiments to ascertain the role of a particular gene in the establishment and progression of the disease. An important arm of this programme deals with the determination of structure of target proteins by crystallography or molecular modeling. The third aspect deals with the docking studies, cell based assays followed by inhibition studies against the target molecules, mycobacterial culture and animal studies. Dr. Tyagi’s group has characterized and established that several targets such as mymA operon which plays an important role in remodeling the structure of pathogen’s cell wall at acidic pH, tyrosine phosphatases involved in cell signaling, BfrA and BfrB proteins involved in iron storage and release, SapM, a phosphatase related to phagolysosomal fusion, Mycobactin biosynthetic pathway involved in sequestering iron for the pathogen and DNA repair enzymes play an important role in the survival of M. tuberculosis in the host, which makes them attractive targets for the development of new therapeutic interventions. His laboratory has also determined the crystal structure of several important M. tuberculosis proteins such as BfrA, BfrB and BirA. The work from his group on several drug targets has resulted in the identification of new lead molecules for the development of more efficacious therapeutic interventions against tuberculosis.
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Last Updated Tuesday, 11 March 2014 12:01