Examples of current projects

1) Iminosugars as potential therapeutic agents

Glycosidases are involved in several important anabolic and catabolic process, such as intestinal digestion, lysosomal catabolism, and post-translational modification, which are closely related to the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) quality control and ER-associated degradation of glycoproteins. Thus, glycosidase-inhibiting iminosugars could have enormous potential applications as biochemical tools and therapeutic agents. These iminosugars can inhibit various glycosidases because of a structural resemblance to their sugar moiety to natural substrates. For example, N-hydroxyetheyl-1-deoxynojirimycin (Glyset^TM), which corresponds to an α-D-glucose configuration, has been approved as a second-generation α-glucosidase inhibitor to treat type-2 diabetes. N-Butyl-1-deoxynojirimycin (Zavesca^TM) is an inhibitor of ceramide-specific glucosyltransferase and has been approved for the oral treatment of substrate reduction therapy in type-1 Gaucher disease. The iminosugar derivatives, α-6-C-nonylisofagomine, α-1-C-nonyl-1, 5-dodeoxy-1, 5-iminoxylitol, and α-1-C-octyl-1-deoxynojirimycin are candidates as oral agents of pharmacological chaperone therapy in type-1 Gaucher disease. Our laboratory provides a unique opportunity to find a range of new medicines for different therapeutic areas from compounds of a defined chemical class.

2) Isolation of water-soluble bioactive components from medicinal plants

Herbal medicines were often traditionally prepared in water but active compounds soluble in water are often hidden by high concentrations of primary metabolites. Our laboratory has a unique experience and track record in identifying novel bioactive compounds in plant water-soluble fractions that can often fully explain the claimed activities of the plants. We believe that the elusive active components of many herbal medicines reside in the water-soluble extractable material; the failure to understand these components may well explain the variable results obtained for many herbal preparations. The water-soluble components of many food plants and products have also been found by our research to contain novel functional components.