Using Yeast Synthetic Lethality To Inform Drug Combination for Malaria

• Main Authors: Guan, Xue Li, Subramaniam, Suvitha, Schmid, Christoph D., Mäser, Pascal
• Other Authors: Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine (LKCMedicine)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: 2018
• Subjects: Antimalarials; Combinatorial Chemotherapy
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/107554; http://hdl.handle.net/10220/44801
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Combinatorial chemotherapy is necessary for the treatment of malaria. However, finding a suitable partner drug for a new candidate is challenging. Here we develop an algorithm that identifies all of the gene pairs of Plasmodium falciparum that possess orthologues in yeast that have a synthetic lethal interaction but are absent in humans. This suggests new options for drug combinations, particularly for inhibitors of targets such as P. falciparum calcineurin, cation ATPase 4, or phosphatidylinositol 4-kinase.