Toxic Treasure.

BIOMOLECULES; MOLECULAR biology; TOXINS; ANIMALS; DRUGS

This article focuses on the Queensland Bioscience Precinct, a project which aims to encourage the discovery of biochemicals that might spawn pharmaceutical products. The bioexplorers focus on molecules derived from animals, instead of from plants. Animals, like plants, have long been known as a source of a vast array of chemicals, many of the with great potential for human use. Many frogs, for instance, secrete compounds through their skin that have powerful antibiotic properties, enabling them to thrive in stagnant water teeming with pathogens. Even compounds from sponges have led to valuable drugs: acyclovir, a treatment for herpes, and cytarabine, for a kind of leukemia. The chief attraction of animal biomolecules, particularly the toxins, is their staggering potency: they are often hundreds of times more powerful than plant compounds that deliver a similar medicinal effect.