Robots can help develop them
published yesterday
Metallic medicine
Researchers used robots and “click chemistry,” a “method where two molecular components are ‘bolted’ together efficiently,” to produce over 600 compounds, said the release. “We opted to use liquid-handling robots to do the chemistry because it’s just combining different reagents in the right ratios,” said Angelo Frei, the lead author of the study, to Live Science. This method allowed for the rapid testing of the compounds, turning months of work into just days, though careful checks were still required.
Revved-up research
The findings come at a time when antibiotic resistance is becoming more of a danger. “The pipeline for new antibiotics has been running dry for decades,” Frei said in the release. “Traditional screening methods are slow and the pharmaceutical industry has largely withdrawn from this space due to low returns on investment. We have to think differently.” Different metal compositions “can hit bacteria in several ways, which matters when single-target drugs stop working,” said Earth.com. A metal center “can change its charge and grip key bacterial proteins, which can stall processes needed for growth.”
There has been a “misconception that metal-based drugs are inherently toxic,” said the release. However, “metal complexes actually have a higher ‘hit rate’ for being antibacterial without being toxic compared to standard organic molecules.” Still, because bacteria evolve quickly, there is a risk of resistance developing to these compounds over time. The good news is that robotic chemistry can significantly speed up research. “The iridium compound we discovered is exciting, but the real breakthrough is the speed at which we found it,” Frei said. “This approach could be the key to avoiding a future where routine infections become fatal again.” The method could also be used beyond antibiotics and help further several areas of biomedical research.
Devika Rao has worked as a staff writer at The Week since 2022, covering science, the environment, climate and business. She previously worked as a policy associate for a nonprofit organization advocating for environmental action from a business perspective.
