Comments on: Round peg, square hole – why our bird flu drugs are a fluke

By: Amiya Sarkar

Amiya Sarkar — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 20:41:24 +0000

The avian influenza virus, in addition, has the ability to mutate notoriously. So, drugs aimed at curbing them need to be tailored at that pace too.

By: Flamethorn

Flamethorn — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 09:36:51 +0000

So can you tell me through what biochemical pathway Tamiflu makes me throw up?

By: Mardonius

Mardonius — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 06:58:01 +0000

Excellent post.
Umm, I may be wrong, but im pretty sure that the knowledge that very small changes in amino acid sequence can radically change functionality even if the changes are away from the active site is taught in 1st year cell biology and biochem subjects…at least, it was taught to me. Hell, I even made a poster and speech on a related topic as an assessment.
Is there more to this story, or is this a relatively recent discovery that has nevertheless made it to an undergrad level, or do we have supposedly 1st class researchers forgeting or ignoring basic protein chemistry? The latter seems unlikely to me, these are very competent scientists by all accounts, so there must be other good reasons to assume very similar active sites.

By: Moses

Moses — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 16:20:53 +0000

A+ post.