Cycloserine fatty acid derivatives as prodrugs: synthesis, degradation and in vitro skin permeability

Improved Topical Drug Delivery: Role of Permeation Enhancers and Advanced Approaches

The delivery of drugs via transdermal routes is an attractive approach due to ease of administration, bypassing of the first-pass metabolism, and the large skin surface area. However, a major drawback is an inability to surmount the skin's stratum corneum (SC) layer. Therefore, techniques reversibly modifying the stratum corneum have been a classical approach. Surmounting the significant barrier properties of the skin in a well-organised, momentary, and harmless approach is still challenging. Chemical permeation enhancers (CPEs) with higher activity are associated with certain side effects restricting their advancement in transdermal drug delivery. Furthermore, complexity in the interaction of CPEs with the skin has led to difficulty in elucidating the mechanism of action. Nevertheless, CPEs-aided transdermal drug delivery will accomplish its full potential due to advancements in analytical techniques, synthetic chemistry, and combinatorial studies. This review focused on techniques such as drug-vehicle interaction, vesicles and their analogues, and novel CPEs such as lipid synthesis inhibitors (LSIs), cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs), and ionic liquids (ILs). In addition, different types of microneedles, including 3D-printed microneedles, have been focused on in this review.

Molecular basis underlying Mycobacterium tuberculosis D-cycloserine resistance. Is there a role for ubiquinone and menaquinone metabolic pathways?

INTRODUCTION

Tuberculosis remains a formidable threat to global public health. Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis presents increasing burden on the control strategy. D-Cycloserine (DCS) is an effective second-line drug against Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M. tuberculosis), the causative agent of tuberculosis. Though less potent than isoniazid (INH) and streptomycin, DCS is crucial for antibiotic-resistant tuberculosis. One advantage of DCS is that less drug-resistant M. tuberculosis is reported in comparison with first-line antituberculosis drugs such as INH and rifampin.

AREAS COVERED

In this review, we summarise our current knowledge of DCS, and review the drug target and low-level resistance of DCS in M. tuberculosis. We summarise the metabolism of D-alanine (D-Ala) and peptidoglycan biosynthesis in bacteria. We first compared the amino acid similarity of Mycobacterium alanine racemase and D-Ala:D-alanine ligase and quite unexpectedly found that the two enzymes are highly conserved among Mycobacterium.

EXPERT OPINION

We summarise the drug targets of DCS and possible mechanisms underlying its low-level resistance for the first time. One significant finding is that ubiquinone and menaquinone metabolism-related genes are novel genes underlying DCS resistance in Escherichia coli and with homologues in M. tuberculosis. Further understanding of DCS targets and basis for its low-level resistance might inspire us to improve the use of DCS or find better drug targets.