BioCentury
ARTICLE | Product Development

Targeting bacterial fatty acids

March 17, 2008 7:00 AM UTC

Affinium Pharmaceuticals Ltd. hopes to address the problem of resistance to antibiotics with a new class of compounds that inhibit bacterial production of fatty acids. Its lead compound, AFN-1252, entered a Phase I study to treat staphylococcal infections this month.

AFN-1252 is a small molecule inhibitor of bacterial enoyl-ACP reductase (FabI). The enzyme is involved in the bacterial fatty-acid synthesis process called FASII, which is necessary for bacterial survival but has yet to be directly targeted with a systemic antibiotic. Research on bacterial fatty-acid synthesis has revealed an alphabet soup of enzymes representing possible therapeutic targets, including FabA, FabK, FabB/FabF, FabD, FabG, FabH, FabI and FabZ...