Nature As Source of Drugs
Despite the rise of combinatorial chemistry as an integral part of lead discovery process, natural products still play a major role as starting material for drug discovery. A report was published in 2007, covering years 1981-2006 details the contribution of biologically occurring chemicals in drug development. According to this report, of the 974 small molecule new chemical entities, 63% were natural derived or semisynthetic derivatives of natural products. For certain therapy areas, such as antimicrobials, antineoplastics, antihypertensive and anti-inflammatory drugs, the numbers were higher. In many cases, these products have been used traditionally for many years.
Natural products may be useful as a source of novel chemical structures for modern techniques of development of antibacterial therapies.
Despite the implied potential, only a fraction of Earth’s living species has been tested for bioactivity.
Read more about this topic: Drug Discovery
Famous quotes containing the words nature, source and/or drugs:
“So Nature deals with us, and takes away
Our playthings one by one, and by the hand
Leads us to rest so gently, that we go
Scarce knowing if we wish to go or stay,
Being too full of sleep to understand
How far the unknown transcends the what we
know.”
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1809–1882)
“As soon as man began considering himself the source of the highest meaning in the world and the measure of everything, the world began to lose its human dimension, and man began to lose control of it.”
—Václav Havel (b. 1936)
“Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
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Guns aren’t lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
You might as well live.”
—Dorothy Parker (1893–1967)