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| Atheris Analytical - Mass spectrometry Biochemistry Protein engineering Metabolic studies | ||
| Atheris Discovery - Venoms to drugs Venoms database Lead discovery Early development Biomarkers | ||
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| Atheris Analytical - Mass spectrometry Biochemistry Protein engineering Metabolic studies | ||
| Atheris Discovery - Venoms to drugs Venoms database Lead discovery Early development Biomarkers | ||
Please note that these pictures are provided here at low resolution, high resolution copies can be made available upon request.
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Venomous Animals - From Venoms to Drugs
Natural products, whether based on microbial, plant, terrestrial animals, marine organisms or other origins have proven to be a rich source of lead compounds in drug discovery. They are indeed at the origin of two third of the drugs marketed worldwide. Venomous animals offer an enormous additional potential. Currently, more than 100’000 venomous animal species are reported, covering almost all phyla (snakes, scorpions, spiders, cone snails, hymenopters, sea anemones, jellyfishes, and even some lizards, birds or fishes). Each of them is characterized by a unique venom composed of hundreds of bioactive ingredients. Venoms are a rich and complex mixture of peptides, proteins and other bioactive molecules. These components have evolved and were optimized by Nature through million years to catch and digest preys or for protection against predators.
Venom molecules are highly potent and selective for physiological targets playing key roles in major human diseases (ion channels, receptors, enzymes, etc.). Animal venoms can indeed be described as goldmines: natural libraries offering millions of bioactive ingredients. Nevertheless, they remain still largely unexplored due to the venom complexity, diversity and rarity. Thus, venoms represent extensive sources of bioactive compounds to discover and develop new drugs and therapeutic agents. Indeed, five venom derived drugs are already on the market. Relying on natural biodiversity is one of our key strategies to discover new lead molecules that can then be optimized in silico to improve on Nature. This huge innovation potential has convinced us to develop our original drug discovery approaches. Our targeted strategy combines genomics, transcriptomics and proteomics to our proprietary databases and bioinformatic tools. At Atheris we are convinced that venomous animals are amongst the most efficient drug developers. More...
Scary Monsters
