October 8, 1999 WASHINGTON (AP) — Scientists have built a compound that mimics a human enzyme important for mopping up destructive molecules inside the body. They hope this synthetic enzyme might one day treat disorders ranging from inflammation to stroke.
When oxygen breaks down, it produces molecules highly damaging to cells. These molecules particularly build up in many inflammatory conditions and cause much of the destruction of brain cells that occurs after a stroke.
The cells of animals and people produce an enzyme called superoxide dismutase, or SOD, that can mop up the damaging molecules.
Doctors for years have thought that giving people additional SOD enzymes could help treat varous illnesses. But when they genetically engineered copies of SOD, the experimental therapy triggered immune reactions in some patients and the body broke down the SOD copies too rapidly for them to work.
Researchers at MetaPhore Pharmaceuticals in St. Louis report Friday in the journal Science that they created a possible alternative: a synthetic compound, based on the metal manganese, that mimics natural SOD.
Lead researcher Daniela Salvemini injected the compound, codenamed M40403, into rats whose paws had been purposefully swollen. The "synzyme" lowered swelling and inhibited damaging molecules that are the main causes of inflammation. In a second experiment, the SOD mimic helped rats live a little longer after undergoing a traumatic blood-flow stoppage in the abdomen.
The testing is preliminary and it will take at least a year before scientists know if such compounds are safe enough to be tested in people. But Salvemini wrote that the synzyme also promises to help scientists understand just how inflammatory diseases do their damage.
Copyright 1999 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
