TWO sponges from the waters around Papua New Guinea contain compounds that
not only protect against HIV infection but also attack cancer cells.
Researchers from the National Cancer Institute in Frederick, Maryland, and
the University of British Columbia in Vancouver isolated four peptides from the
sponges Theonella mirabilis and Theonella swinhoei. In lab
tests, the peptides鈥攃alled papuamides鈥攑revented HIV from infecting
T-cells and killed a variety of human cancer cells.
The compounds are too complex to synthesise economically, but their unique
activity will be 鈥渦sed as a tool to figure out how they鈥檙e killing cells鈥�, says
team member Raymond Andersen of the University of British Columbia. The research
will be published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.
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