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Document<br />

1<br />

Inhibitors of HIV-1 Protease<br />

Krzysztof Appelt<br />

Agouron Pharmaceuticals, Inc., San Diego, California<br />

I. Introduction<br />

Page 1<br />

Since the discovery of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) as the causative agent of acquired<br />

immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), perhaps the largest and most powerful consortium of scientists<br />

ever assembled to tackle a single disease has been brought to bear on the problem of AIDS and its<br />

treatment. From an unprecedented wealth of information regarding the molecular biology and virology<br />

of HIV collected in recent years, it became possible to identify numerous intervention points in the viral<br />

life cycle that could be exploited in the development of drugs for AIDS therapy (for reviews see<br />

Reference 1, 2, and 3). Among these, the virally-encoded enzymes, in particular reverse transcriptase<br />

and protease, have emerged as the most popular targets. A separate chapter of this book is dedicated to<br />

the description of reverse transcriptase and its inhibitors [4]. For the purpose of introduction only, it<br />

should be noted that nucleoside inhibitors of reverse transcriptase (AZT, ddI, ddC, d4T, and 3TC) have<br />

been widely used in clinical practice since 1987. Since then it has become apparent that this class of<br />

agents, while slowing progression of disease in HIV-infected patients, is limited in both activity and the<br />

duration of the clinical responses produced. Therefore in the search for better anti-HIV agents, the focus<br />

of effort was expanded to include the search for clinically useful inhibitors of a second viral enzyme,<br />

namely the protease. In contrast to reverse transcriptase, for which activity is required prior to the<br />

integration of viral genetic information into the host cell chromosomes, the viral protease plays a key<br />

role late in the virus life cycle and inhibitors of this enzyme display equal anti-viral activity in chronic<br />

and acute infection models in vitro [5].<br />

The HIV protease (HIV PR) is encoded <strong>by</strong> the 5' portion of the retroviral pol gene, which encodes all<br />

replicative enzymes. Viral structural proteins (p24,<br />

http://legacy.netlibrary.com/nlreader/nlReader.dll?bookid=12640&filename=Page_1.html [2/29/2004 2:14:53 AM]

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