Chemistry provides a new supply of a promising cancer and HIV treatment

For many years the natural product Bryostatin has been used a promising treatment for cancer. However, the product has been rapidly decreased recently. THE world’s supple of the chemical is about half of what it was at in 1990. This is because it is hard to extract in large qualities from the sea creatures which produce it. On October 6, Stanford researches reported to, The Journal Science, they have discovered a more efficient way to make this compound, in the lab. This new synthetic supply will be used to treat clinical trials for: cancer immunotherapy, treating Alzheimer’s disease, and treat HIV.

The process of trying to extract sufficient amounts of Bryostatin began almost 50 years ago with a chemist at Stanford, Paul Wender, coming across a happy accident in the Gulf of Mexico. It started with a fishing expedition when scientists discovered marine life contained many of the pharmaceuticals, like bryostatin, they were looking for. Because of this a marine biologist, Paul Wender, collected a vast number of marine organisms from the Gulf of Mexico and sent them to Natio Cancer Institute for analysis. Researches then discovered an organism, brown bryozoan, contained the active ingredient bryostatin 1. However, bryostatin 1 is very hard to come by; NCI scientists gathered up 14 tons of the organism and only managed to extract 18 grams of bryostatin. Another issue they ran into is the organism (brown bryozoan) only grows in specific conditions and at certain times of the year.

After decades of experimenting and experience with bryostatin analogs, a team of scientists from Stanford could synthesize bryostatin 1 substantially simpler and more efficient than extracting it from organisms. Scientist Paul Wender says, “The talent and dedication of this group made possible an achievement which many had thought impossible … We are so fortunate to have people who are undeterred by that”. The team has now produced over 2 grams of bryostatin 1 and once the production scale is increased many believe over 20 grams could be produced per year. This would be enough to help clinical/research needs and more than enough to treat around 20,000 cancer patients or 40,000 Alzheimer’s patients. Bryostatin 1 has also been used as HIV/AIDS research, so this major chemical discovery will help several people in this world.

The reason why I chose this article for my blog post is because I thought it was interesting how scientists made something that seemed nearly impossible at one point a reality. I think it goes to show how quickly science is advancing along with the speed of technology. This is just the first of many scientific discoveries, I believe there will be many more to come.

Collins, N. (2017 October 12). New method developed by Stanford chemists may replenish dwindling supply of a promising cancer and HIV treatment. https://news.stanford.edu/press/view/16706