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Principal Investigator: Dr. Craig Altier
Contact Information: E-mail: ca223@cornell.edu - Phone: 607-253-3926
Sponsor: NIH-Northeast Biodefense Programs
Grant Number: 3189-01
Title: Rational Drug Design Targeting CSRA
Annual Direct Cost: $86,170
Project Period: 03/01/07-02/28/08
DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The use of bacterial pathogens as biowarfare agents, particularly those that have been made resistant to existing antibiotics, makes the development of new antimicrobial therapies of great importance to biodefense. As the specific identity of a biowarfare agent might not be immediately recognized, it is further essential to develop antimicrobials of broad spectrum. This requires the targeting of a rare group of essential bacterial functions that are held in common by a diverse group of organisms, but are absent in man and other animals. Additionally, a novel method to combat bacterial pathogens would be to target common bacterial virulence functions, rather than simply bacterial viability. One promising candidate for such functions is CsrA, a small post-transcriptional regulatory protein that binds specific mRNA. It exists in many bacterial species, including several Select Agents, and functions to control both central metabolism and virulence traits. We thus propose here to screen and test inhibitors of CsrA for their antimicrobial and anti-virulence effects.
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