jrd@mit-amt.MIT.EDU (Jim Davis) (10/09/85)
Can someone say whether a human needs to have any RNA reverse-transciptase? If not, could one not design an enzyme specially made to disable it, and inhibit HTLV by placing large amounts of said enzyme in one's body? I suppose you'd need to have some "friendly" infectious organism in order to synthesize the quantities needed. Is recombinant technology anywhere near able to do this?
sdyer@bbncc5.UUCP (Steve Dyer) (10/09/85)
> Can someone say whether a human needs to have any RNA > reverse-transciptase? If not, could one not design an enzyme specially > made to disable it, and inhibit HTLV by placing large amounts of said > enzyme in one's body? I suppose you'd need to have some "friendly" > infectious organism in order to synthesize the quantities needed. Is > recombinant technology anywhere near able to do this? A number of new drugs (and some old ones--e.g., suramin, long used in the treatment of trypanosomiasis) inhibit RNA reverse-transscriptase and are presently undergoing clinical trials. Enzymes aren't necessarily needed; lots of simple (well, simple compared to enzymes) compounds bind to enzymes and render them inactive. One problem with such treatments, at least at the stage of the disease where they are being administered now, is that although HTLV-III might no longer be isolated from the patient, the T-cell situation does not seem to improve. -- /Steve Dyer {harvard,seismo}!bbnccv!bbncc5!sdyer sdyer@bbncc5.ARPA
zben@umcp-cs.UUCP (Ben Cranston) (10/11/85)
In article <17@mit-amt.MIT.EDU> jrd@mit-amt.MIT.EDU (Jim Davis) writes: >Can someone say whether a human needs to have any RNA >reverse-transciptase? If not, could one not design an enzyme specially >made to disable it, and inhibit HTLV by placing large amounts of said >enzyme in one's body? I suppose you'd need to have some "friendly" >infectious organism in order to synthesize the quantities needed. Is >recombinant technology anywhere near able to do this? And just how long would it take for HTLV to evolve a functional reverse- transcriptase that evaded your putative new enzyme? This same phenomenon is happening with antibiotic-resistant microbes, although the plasmid scheme for distributing the new genes makes it even more dangerous. Very good thought though. I think we need to think about the relative efficiencies of USING evolution, or at least recognizing that evolution has done a much better job of structuring US than we could hope to do manually. Then again, I'd hate to have to wait 100,000 years for a cure for AIDS... -- Ben Cranston ...seismo!umcp-cs!zben zben@umd2.ARPA
werner@aecom.UUCP (Craig Werner) (10/12/85)
When several months ago I posted the list of anti-AIDS drugs to
net.med, 5 out of 6 of the ones I mentioned were anti-reverse transcriptase
inhibitors (Reverse Transcriptase, which converts RNA to double stranded
DNA is found only in retroviruses.)
The problems are 1) it only inhibits the virus, doesn't kill it, since
once the virus is established in humans, it doesn't need RT.
and 2) the drugs have many side effects, including liver toxicity.
For instance, Rock Hudson almost died in France from liver failure caused by
the HPA-23 he was taking to slow AIDS.
--
Craig Werner
!philabs!aecom!werner
"When I was your age, I did it for half an hour every day."