Dylan Stoll | Health Editor
Featured Image: The long sought-after cure for the common cold is closer than you may think. | Courtesy of Pixabay
The common cold, one of humanity’s timeless, undefeated foes, may have finally met its match in what scientists are calling IMP-1088 — a drug with history-making properties.
As most already know, the common cold has no cure. This is for a number of reasons, but most importantly, it is because it is a member of the rhinoviruses — a family of viruses with a plethora of different forms. This makes it very difficult, not only for the immune system to defeat the virus, but for us to produce a vaccine that could prevent the virus in the first place.
Thankfully, IMP-1088 may be the answer. The scientists who first created the drug were originally looking to produce a compound that would target proteins in malaria parasites.
By combining two different candidate compounds, they produced a new compound that blocks a human enzyme known as N-myristoyltransferase (NMT). Interestingly, NMT is required by viruses to produce a protective shell around their genetic information.
When a virus invades a human cell, it steals NMT from the cell it has invaded. However, if the enzyme is blocked, the virus will be unable to take it and thus will be unable to produce the shell. Without the shell, the process of replication that the cold virus goes through is inhibited.
The common cold, though ordinary, is anything but average; for some, it could spell disaster every time they catch it. Professor Ed Tate of Imperial College London in the UK, a member of the team researching this new compound, explained to MedicalNewsToday the importance of eradicating this virus.
“The common cold is an inconvenience for most of us, but can cause serious complications in people with conditions like asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease,” Tate said.
“A drug like this could be extremely beneficial if given early in infection, and we are working on making a version that could be inhaled so that it gets to the lungs quickly.”
Previous attempts to produce a compound that targets NMT have either failed due to their toxicity, or they were much less effective in their ability to block NMT. IMP-1088 is the first to be non-toxic, and it is 100 times more potent than any other NMT-targeting drug available. With all that said, the miracle compound still requires extensive testing.
“The way the drug works means that we would need to be sure it was being used against the cold virus, and not similar conditions with different causes, to minimize the chance of toxic side effects,” Tate explained.
