Drug repurposing (also called drug repositioning, reprofiling or re-tasking) is a strategy for identifying new therapeutic uses for approved or existing drugs. It is a useful approach which accelerates the drug discovery process through the identification of a novel clinical use for an old or existing drug candidate. On the other hand, polypharmacology (or multi-targeting approach) can be defined by multiple interactions of drugs with several known targets for an indication/disease and/or the interactions with multiple targets of different indications/diseases.
Given the high attrition rates, substantial costs and slow pace of drug discovery and development, repurposing of 'old' drugs to treat common, difficult-to-treat and rare diseases is increasingly becoming an attractive avenue because it involves the use of low risked compounds (with already known safety profiles), which potentially lower overall development costs and shorter development time-lines.
Emergent deadly diseases including cancer, cardiovascular illness, diabetes, and infectious diseases including coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) have a huge mortality, morbidity, and impose a heavy economic burden across the globe. In COVID-19, drug repurposing could accelerate the identification of drugs that can treat or prevent COVID-19. Drugs that have already proven to be safe and effective in humans could be approved for the treatment of COVID-19. However, this is not always successful and challenges/pitfalls do exist. For instance, the development of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) (antimalarial drug) and remdesivir (antiviral drug) to be used as anti-COVID-19 drugs were not completely successful because of fatal toxicities and unsatisfactory effectiveness in clinical controlled trials (WHO Solidarity and UK Recovery Trials), respectively.
Currently available (or approved) drugs are therapeutically inadequate for the majority of these diseases mentioned, and therefore, there is an urgent need for new drug treatments. Drug molecules with beneficial multi-target activities (polypharmacology) are extremely interesting in drug repurposing, because they offer potentially higher therapeutic efficacy and a synergistic effect. The scope of this proposed Research Topic includes drug repurposing and polypharmacology-based approaches being employed in the discovery and development of drug molecules for deadly infectious and non-infectious diseases. This topic will provide an insight into the recent advances and developments (experimental and computational) in therapeutic areas, as well as in the drug discovery associated technologies and challenges.
This Research Topic is open for original research and review papers that focus on but are not limited to the following topics:
• Drug repurposing and polypharmacology in drug discovery
• Computational multi-target drug design
• Drug repurposing and in silico designing approach
• Computational polypharmacology
• Multi-targeting approach in drug discovery
• Systems and network pharmacology and drug discovery
• Multi-targeting of bioactive phytochemicals
• Multi-target mechanism and signaling pathways
• Emerging drug targets and drug discovery
• Novel drug targets in anticancer drug discovery
• Novel drug targets in anti-COVID-19 drug discovery
• Drug repurposing for rare and difficult to treat diseases
Drug repurposing (also called drug repositioning, reprofiling or re-tasking) is a strategy for identifying new therapeutic uses for approved or existing drugs. It is a useful approach which accelerates the drug discovery process through the identification of a novel clinical use for an old or existing drug candidate. On the other hand, polypharmacology (or multi-targeting approach) can be defined by multiple interactions of drugs with several known targets for an indication/disease and/or the interactions with multiple targets of different indications/diseases.
Given the high attrition rates, substantial costs and slow pace of drug discovery and development, repurposing of 'old' drugs to treat common, difficult-to-treat and rare diseases is increasingly becoming an attractive avenue because it involves the use of low risked compounds (with already known safety profiles), which potentially lower overall development costs and shorter development time-lines.
Emergent deadly diseases including cancer, cardiovascular illness, diabetes, and infectious diseases including coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) have a huge mortality, morbidity, and impose a heavy economic burden across the globe. In COVID-19, drug repurposing could accelerate the identification of drugs that can treat or prevent COVID-19. Drugs that have already proven to be safe and effective in humans could be approved for the treatment of COVID-19. However, this is not always successful and challenges/pitfalls do exist. For instance, the development of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) (antimalarial drug) and remdesivir (antiviral drug) to be used as anti-COVID-19 drugs were not completely successful because of fatal toxicities and unsatisfactory effectiveness in clinical controlled trials (WHO Solidarity and UK Recovery Trials), respectively.
Currently available (or approved) drugs are therapeutically inadequate for the majority of these diseases mentioned, and therefore, there is an urgent need for new drug treatments. Drug molecules with beneficial multi-target activities (polypharmacology) are extremely interesting in drug repurposing, because they offer potentially higher therapeutic efficacy and a synergistic effect. The scope of this proposed Research Topic includes drug repurposing and polypharmacology-based approaches being employed in the discovery and development of drug molecules for deadly infectious and non-infectious diseases. This topic will provide an insight into the recent advances and developments (experimental and computational) in therapeutic areas, as well as in the drug discovery associated technologies and challenges.
This Research Topic is open for original research and review papers that focus on but are not limited to the following topics:
• Drug repurposing and polypharmacology in drug discovery
• Computational multi-target drug design
• Drug repurposing and in silico designing approach
• Computational polypharmacology
• Multi-targeting approach in drug discovery
• Systems and network pharmacology and drug discovery
• Multi-targeting of bioactive phytochemicals
• Multi-target mechanism and signaling pathways
• Emerging drug targets and drug discovery
• Novel drug targets in anticancer drug discovery
• Novel drug targets in anti-COVID-19 drug discovery
• Drug repurposing for rare and difficult to treat diseases