earticle

영어

We herein report a systems biology approach for drug targeting and discovery against microbial pathogens, which was demonstrated with an opportunistic human pathogen Vibrio vulnificus CMCP6 as an example. This systems biological approach employs reconstructing a genomescale metabolic network of the target organism, and predicting drug targets using constraints-based flux analysis. The latter is especially focused on predicting so called essential metabolites whose absence disrupts cell growth. Results of the systematic predictions were rigorously validated by subsequent wet experiments, and were followed by drug discovery phase that makes use of the predicted information. This systematic approach should facilitate initial stage of drug discovery as well as other human-related diseases. [This work was supported by the Korean Systems Biology Research Project (20100002164) and World Class University program (R322009000101420) of the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology through the National Research Foundation of Korea.]