Inhibitors of tRNA-Synthetases as Antimalarials

Ralph Mazitschek of the Massachusetts General Hospital in the U.S. will explore whether inhibitors of tRNA-synthetases, which are enzymes that are essential for survival of the malaria parasite, are effective antimalarial drugs. New classes of drugs that work in different ways are urgently needed because current antimalarials can induce clinical resistance rendering them ineffective. Once they have developed an assay to measure tRNA-synthetase inhibition, it will be used to screen a compound library including the 400 antimalarial compounds in the so-called Malaria Box collection to identify selective inhibitors for further testing.