AsiaIPEX is a one-stop-shop for players in the IP industry, facilitating IP trade and connection to the IP world. Whether you are a patent owner interested in selling your IP, or a manufacturer looking to buy technologies to upgrade your operation, you will find the portal a useful resource.
Back to search results

Antimicrobial Peptides to Treat African Sleeping Sickness

Countries
United States
Application No.
8,475,767
*Abstract

Application(Product)

  • Treatmentof sleeping sickness in humans
  • Treatmentof wasting disease in cattle
  • Potentialtherapeutic intervention applicable for a variety of protozoa, including butnot limited to kinetoplastid protozoa
  • Demonstratedability to kill the bloodstream form of kinetoplastid protozoans of the genus Trypansoma

ProblemsAddressed    (benefits/advantages)

  • Safer than current treatments
  • Potential for broad application
  • Desirable effects of treatment include:
  • preventing occurrence or recurrence of disease
  • alleviation of symptoms
  • diminishment of any direct or indirectpathological consequences of the disease
  • decreasing the rate of disease progression
  • amelioration or palliation of the diseasestate, and;
  • remission or improved prognosis

    • TechnologySummary

    Trypanosomabrucei (T. brucei) is aparasitic protist species that is the causative agent of both a veterinarywasting disease & human African trypanosomiasis, otherwise known assleeping sickness. Currently, approximately 500,000 people are infected withAfrican trypanosomes. The subspecies Trypanosomabrucei brucei (T. b. brucei)causes a wasting disease in cattle. No vaccines are available for prevention ofinfection by T. brucei and withoutchemotherapeutic treatment, T. bruceikills its victims. Drugs currently in use are quite toxic and cause seriousside effects and sometimes death. Consequently, there is a strong need for newand safer drugs for the treatment of trypanosomiasis, and new drugs must bedeveloped in order to prepare for possible emergence of drug resistance in theparasites.

    Using hydrophobic signal sequence peptides, University ofGeorgia researchers developed a method of treating/preventing T. brucei infection.  These peptides exhibit reduced or no toxicitytowards mammalian cell lines and induced limited or no hemolysis.  The invention demonstrates, for the firsttime, the trypanocidal activity of hydrophobic signal sequence and providesmethods of killing, inhibiting the growth, and/or inhibiting the reproductionof kinetoplastid protozoan, including, but not limited to, kinetoplastidprotozoan of the genus Trypanosoma.

    Inventors

    ·        SteveHajduk

    ·        JohnHarrington

     

    TheHajduk laboratory is interested in the molecular and biochemical basis ofparasitic diseases.  They are currentlystudying African trypanosomes which are important protozoan parasites causinghuman African sleeping sickness and Nagana in cattle.  They have made important contributions to theunderstanding the biology of these parasites and have investigated theunderlying mechanisms and function of gene expression, RNA editing, humaninnate immunity to trypanosome infection and the role of membrane nanotubes andextracellular vesicles (EVs) in communication between trypanosomes and withhost cells. Research in the Hajduk laboratory has been funded by NIH, WHO andthe Burroughs Wellcome Fund.

     

    http://www.bmb.uga.edu/labs/hajduk

     

    TechnologyDevelopment and IP Status

    ·        Pre-clinicalstage

    ·        USPatent Nos. 8,475,767 & 9,079,977
    *IP Issue Date
    None
    *IP Type
    Utility
    Country/Region
    USA

    For more information, please click Here
    Mobile Device