Use of RIT-Seq to Decode Antitrypanosomal Drug Efficacy and Resistance
Alsford, Eckert et al., Nature
A team led by investigators at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine this week reports its use of all five current human African trypanosomiasis drugs in a genome-scale RNA interference target sequencing screen in Trypanosoma brucei, which it says revealed the "transporters, organelles, enzymes and metabolic pathways that function to facilitate antitrypanosomal drug action." Taking this RIT-seq profiling approach, the team identified "both known drug importers and the only known pro-drug activator, and [linked] more than fifty additional genes to drug action," it writes.