Para-Aminosalicylic Acid Acts as an Alternative Substrate of Folate Metabolism in Mycobacterium tuberculosis

• Autores: Sumit Chakraborty, Todd Gruber
• Localización: Science, ISSN 0036-8075, Vol. 339, Nº 6115, 2013, págs. 89-91
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Folate biosynthesis is an established anti-infective target, and the antifolate para-aminosalicylic acid (PAS) was one of the first anti-infectives introduced into clinical practice on the basis of target-based drug discovery. Fifty years later, PAS continues to be used to treat tuberculosis. PAS is assumed to inhibit dihydropteroate synthase (DHPS) in Mycobacterium tuberculosis by mimicking the substrate p-aminobenzoate (PABA). However, we found that sulfonamide inhibitors of DHPS inhibited growth of M. tuberculosis only weakly because of their intracellular metabolism. In contrast, PAS served as a replacement substrate for DHPS. Products of PAS metabolism at this and subsequent steps in folate metabolism inhibited those enzymes, competing with their substrates. PAS is thus a prodrug that blocks growth of M. tuberculosis when its active forms are generated by enzymes in the pathway they poison.