STaurosporine Analogs to the Rescue

Fungi are a group of remarkably diverse and ubiquitous organisms, without which we could absolutely not live. Yet, fungi that thrive as pathogens pose grave medical and economic challenges. Every year, 125 million tonnes of the top five food crops are destroyed and 1.5 million humans die due to fungal diseases. The current therapeutic options are insufficient. We have previously found that the natural compound staurosporine could offer a potential solution to these problems due to its vigorous antifungal properties. But, because staurosporine lacks specificity, we propose to generate molecular derivatives from it. We are confident that our work will reveal novel compounds that can be developed into not only potent but also safe antifungals. Preliminary work has already hinted at three promising derivatives. Our project addresses a problem of high public interest and could be a major steppingstone for the advancement of new drugs to be applied into clinical or agricultural practice.