Development of Potential Small Molecule Therapeutics for Treatment of Ebola Virus Disease

Title:Development of Potential Small Molecule Therapeutics for Treatment of Ebola Virus Disease

Volume: 25 Issue: 38

Author(s): Adam Schafer, Han Cheng, Charles Lee, Ruikun Du, Julianna Han, Jasmine Perez, Norton Peet, Balaji Manicassamy and Lijun Rong*

Affiliation:

• Department of Microbiology and Immunology, College of Medicine, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60612,United States

Keywords: Ebola virus, viral pathogens, ebolavirus genus, ebola virus entry mechanisms, transcription and replication mechanisms, marburg virus.

Abstract: Ebola virus has caused 26 outbreaks in 10 different countries since its identification in 1976, making it one of the deadliest emerging viral pathogens. The most recent outbreak in West Africa from 2014-16 was the deadliest yet and culminated in 11,310 deaths out of 28,616 confirmed cases. Currently, there are no FDA-approved therapeutics or vaccines to treat Ebola virus infections. The slow development of effective vaccines combined with the severity of past outbreaks emphasizes the need to accelerate research into understanding the virus lifecycle and the development of therapeutics for post exposure treatment. Here we present a summary of the major findings on the Ebola virus replication cycle and the therapeutic approaches explored to treat this devastating disease. The major focus of this review is on small molecule inhibitors.

Cite this article as:

Schafer Adam , Cheng Han , Lee Charles , Du Ruikun , Han Julianna, Perez Jasmine, Peet Norton , Manicassamy Balaji and Rong Lijun *, Development of Potential Small Molecule Therapeutics for Treatment of Ebola Virus Disease, Current Medicinal Chemistry 2018; 25 (38) . https://dx.doi.org/10.2174/0929867324666171010141416