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AZT

AZT

AZT

    The AIDS virus is one of the most deadly and most wide spread diseases
in the modern era. The disease was first found in 1981 as doctors around the
United States began to report groups of young, homosexual men developing a rare
pneumonia caused by an organism called Penumocystis carini. These patients then
went on to develop many other new and rare complications that had previously
been seen only in patients with severely damaged immune systems. The Center for
Disease Control in the United States named this new epidemic the acquired
immunodeficiency syndrome and defined it by a specific set of symptoms. In 1983,
researchers finally identified the virus that caused AIDS. They named the virus
the human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV. AIDS causes the immune system of the
infected patient to become much less efficient until it stops working altogether.

    The first drug that was approved by the American Food and Drug
administration for use in treating the AIDS virus is called AZT, which stands
for azido-thymidine. AZT was released under the brand name of Retrovir and it's
chemical name is Zidovudine, or ZDV. The structural name of AZT is 3'-azido-3'-
deoxythymidine. AZT works by inhibiting the process of copying DNA in cells.
More specifically, AZT, inhibits the reverse transcriptase enzyme, which is
involved in the DNA replication process. When DNA is replicating in a cell,
there is a specific enzyme that works along one side of the original DNA strand
as the DNA is split into two strands, copying each individual nucleotide. This
enzyme is only able to work in one direction along the nucleotide string,
therefore a different enzyme, or rather a series of different enzymes is
required to work in the opposite direction. Reverse transcriptase is one of the
enzymes that is required to work in the opposite direction. AZT works by bonding
to the reverse transcriptase enzyme, thereby making it unable to bond with the
nucleotide string and making it unable to fulfill it's role. This whole process
is used by the HIV virus to replicate itself so that it can continue to infect
more cells.

    AZT was originally developed over 20 years ago for the treatment of
lukemia. The concept behind this was that the AZT was supposed to terminate the
DNA synthesis in the growing lukemia lymphocytes, thereby stopping the disease.
AZT was rejected at this point because it failed to lengthen the lives of test
animals.

    The problem with the AZT drug is that it is not perfect.

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