• Question: what other things do you find when looking for drugs

    Asked by anon-361023 to Rebecca W on 28 Mar 2023.
    • Photo: Rebecca Woods

      Rebecca Woods answered on 28 Mar 2023:

      Sometimes you can find a different reaction/product than you would expect. Other times when you are making a molecule to be a potential treatment for one thing, it won’t work but will be great for something else. One of the drugs used to treat infection with T. brucei (HAT), is called eflornithine, it was designed to be a cancer treatment, but it didn’t work for that. It was repurposed for HAT (which was great as the old drug contained arsenic) and later repurposed again for unwanted facial hair.

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