Metabonomics (or metabolomics) aims at the comprehensive and quantitative analysis of the wide arrays of metabolites in biological samples. Metabonomics has been labeled as one of the new" -omics" joining genomics, transcriptomics, and proteomics as a science employed toward the understanding of global systems biology. It has been widely applied in many research areas including drug toxicology, biomarker discovery, functional genomics, and molecular pathology etc. The comprehensive analysis of the metabonome is particularly challenging due to the diverse chemical natures of metabolites. Metabonomics investigations require special approaches for sample preparation, data-rich analytical chemical measurements, and information mining. The outputs from a metabonomics study allow sample classification, biomarker discovery, and interpretation of the reasons for classification information. This review focuses on the currently new advances in various technical platforms of metabonomics and its applications in drug discovery and development, disease biomarker identification, plant and microbe related fields.
Biomarkers ; Drug Discovery ; Metabolome ; Metabolomics ; trends

In the past century, as medical research has become increasingly precise, it has become clear that the incidence and progression of many diseases involve multiple factors and pathologies; this is particularly true for the degenerative and metabolic diseases facing industrialized societies. At the same time, it becomes increasingly clear that single-target action drugs cannot effectively treat these diseases. Researchers are looking toward the chemical industry as well as traditional herbal medicines to find multi-target interventions. Thus, a new era in drug discovery has begun. Specifically, three approaches have proven effective in seeking multi-target drugs. These are: (1) designing drugs with multiple components; (2) discovering drugs through the study of synergistic compound-compound interactions in medicinal herbs or among chemical drugs and herbal components; and (3) developing drugs to tackle complex multi-component diseases. The authors conclude that there is an increasing need for multi-component remedies to treat the complex chronic diseases afflicting modern populations. Given this situation and the growing body of evidence that these new approaches are effective, multi-target intervention appears to have great potential for discovering, designing, and developing effective new drugs for today's diseases.
Drug Design ; Drug Discovery ; trends ; Drug Synergism ; Herb-Drug Interactions ; Humans ; Molecular Targeted Therapy ; trends ; Plants, Medicinal

Chemogenomics/chemical genomics has been widely used in novel drug research and discovery. Firstly, the concept of chemogenomics was introduced briefly. Secondly, we reviewed the progress of novel drug research and discovery based on forward chemogenomics, reverse chemogenomics and predictive chemogenomics. Finally, we showed progress of the research that chemogenomics has been used to novel drug research and discovery in pharmaceuticals companies.
Animals ; Drug Delivery Systems ; Drug Discovery ; methods ; Drug Industry ; trends ; Genomics ; methods ; Humans ; Pharmacogenetics ; methods

Biomedical Research ; trends ; Drug Discovery ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; Japan ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; Medicine, Kampo ; Travel

Referring to the rapid developed life science and the higher requirements for the approval of innovative Chinese drugs in recent years, this paper described systematically the discovery, research and development (R&D) approaches for the innovative Chinese drugs under the new situation from the following five aspects, i. e., active components discovered from TCMs, the discovery of effective fractions of TCMs and their formulae, the R&D of TCM innovative drugs based on famous classic prescriptions and famous Chinese patent drugs, and the transformation of clinical effective prescriptions, on the basis of analysing the advantages of innovative drugs derived from natural products based on TCM theories and the problems existed in current R&D of new TCM drugs. Moreover, five suggestions are also given for the rapid development of TCM innovative drugs in China. All these will provide reference for the R&D of TCM innovative drugs.
China ; Drug Discovery ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; chemistry ; isolation & purification ; pharmacology ; Humans ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; trends ; Research

Toxoplasmosis is an opportunistic infection caused by the protozoan parasite Toxoplasma gondii. T. gondii is widespread globally and causes severe diseases in individuals with impaired immune defences as well as congenitally infected infants. The high prevalence rate in some parts of the world such as South America and Africa, coupled with the current drug treatments that trigger hypersensitivity reactions, makes the development of immunotherapeutics intervention a highly important research priority. Immunotherapeutics strategies could either be a vaccine which would confer a pre-emptive immunity to infection, or passive immunization in cases of disease recrudescence or recurrent clinical diseases. As the severity of clinical manifestations is often greater in developing nations, the development of well-tolerated and safe immunotherapeutics becomes not only a scientific pursuit, but a humanitarian enterprise. In the last few years, much progress has been made in vaccine research with new antigens, novel adjuvants, and innovative vaccine delivery such as nanoparticles and antigen encapsulations. A literature search over the past 5 years showed that most experimental studies were focused on DNA vaccination at 52%, followed by protein vaccination which formed 36% of the studies, live attenuated vaccinations at 9%, and heterologous vaccination at 3%; while there were few on passive immunization. Recent progress in studies on vaccination, passive immunization, as well as insights gained from these immunotherapeutics is highlighted in this review.
Drug Discovery/trends ; Global Health ; Humans ; Immunization/*methods ; Immunotherapy/*methods/trends ; Protozoan Vaccines/immunology/isolation & purification ; Toxoplasma/*immunology ; Toxoplasmosis/*therapy

As the actual clinical reflecting of transform Chinese medicine special curative effect, Chinese medicine preparation not only satisfies the need of hospital clinic, scientific research and teaching, but also plays an important role in deepening medical and health system reform, improving people's health level and contributing to the economic growth. However, some problems about administration and approval (tending to western medicine), contraction of the scale, lack of synchronization for clinic and scientific research, and the imbalance of regional development make Chinese medicine preparation move forwards slowly in contradiction. It has not only reduced the effectiveness of the Chinese medicine preparation in hospital clinic, but also brought bad effect on modernized development of Chinese medicine preparation. Research shows that main influencing factors of status quo of Chinese medicine preparation in medical institution include imperfect laws and regulations, high cost than income, and shortage of talents in preparation research. The analysis indicated that the necessary measures to break the contradiction, improve clinical effect of Chinese medicine, and promote the modernization development of Chinese drugs preparation were as follows: government and related departments should strengthen the supporting force in policy by adjusting the examination and approval policy, speeding up dispensing use, reforming pricing system, including into medicare reimbursement, integrating advantage resources and so on; medical institution should actively carry out research and development of traditional Chinese Medicine through drawing the traditional and modern essence, reserving professional talents, and developing characteristic preparation; companies cooperate with hospitals for complementary advantages, which can rapidly transform Chinese medicine preparation into clinical practice.
Chemistry, Pharmaceutical ; economics ; methods ; trends ; China ; Drug Discovery ; economics ; trends ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; chemistry ; economics ; pharmacology ; Humans ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; economics ; trends

This paper outlines briefly the role of nuclear medicine in life sciences and health care. Molecular imaging by using isotopic tracers can noninvasively visualize the chemistry or hidden process in the cells and tissues inside the body, obtaining "functional" images to provide early information of any disease and revealing the secrets of life. The vitality of nuclear medicine is its ability to translate bench into new clinical application that can benefits the patients. Although nuclear medicine community in China has made significant achievement with a great effort since 1950s, there are many obstacles to future development. Recommended measures are proposed here in an attempt to solve our existing problems.
Biological Science Disciplines ; trends ; China ; Delivery of Health Care ; trends ; Drug Discovery ; Humans ; Nuclear Medicine ; education ; instrumentation ; trends ; Patient Education as Topic ; Professional Practice ; Radiopharmaceuticals

The compound Chinese materia medica is the medication pattern of the traditional Chinese medicine for the disease prevention and treatment. The single Chinese materia medica (mostly in decoction pieces) is the prescription composition of the compound Chinese materia medica. The study of the effective substance basis of Chinese materia medica should be based on the chemical compositions of the compound Chinese materia medica as an entry point considering the different status of "Monarch, Minister, Assistant, and Guide" for a certain single Chinese materia medica in the different compound Chinese materia medica while substance basis research of a certain single Chinese materia medica should be a full component analysis as well as both stable and controllable quality. Substance basis research on Chinese materia medica is one of key scientific problems of inheriting, development and innovation of Chinese materia medica.
China ; Drug Discovery ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; chemistry ; pharmacology ; Humans ; Materia Medica ; chemistry ; pharmacology ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; trends

The research and development (R&D) process of Chinese medicine, with one notable feature, clinical application based, is significantly different from which of chemical and biological medicine, from laboratory research to clinics. Besides, compound prescription is another character. Therefore, according to different R&D theories between Chinese and Western medicine, we put forward a new strategy in drug design of Chinese medicine, which focuses on "combination-activity relationship (CAR)", taking prescription discovery, component identification and formula optimization as three key points to identify the drugs of high efficacy and low toxicity. The method of drug design of Chinese medicine includes: new prescription discovery based on clinical data and literature information, component identification based on computing and experimental research, as well as formula optimization based on system modeling. This paper puts forward the concept, research framework and techniques of drug design of Chinese medicine, which embodies the R&D model of Chinese medicine, hoping to support the drug design of Chinese medicine theoretically and technologically.
Algorithms ; Community Networks ; organization & administration ; Computational Biology ; methods ; Drug Design ; Drug Discovery ; methods ; Humans ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; methods ; trends ; Models, Biological ; Models, Theoretical ; Research Design