Innovative drugs from peptide toxins – PEPTOMED

Animal venoms are composed of molecular entities (toxins) used for killing and paralyzing prey. These biologically active molecules are endowed with high selectivity and efficacy, exquisitely optimized by the evolution process.

Toxins are both molecular tools for the study of their receptors and potential lead molecules for the development of novel therapeutics. Their receptors are involved in various human pathologies. Venoms thus represent the natural equivalent of the large chemical libraries used by the pharmaceutical industry for drug discovery. They however offer the advantage of containing only biologically active molecules.

The mission of the PEPTOMED project is the discovery and development of novel therapeutics from venom peptides. The vision developed is to explore the enormous structural and pharmacological wealth of animal venoms, using an innovative technology. This will lead to the development of drugs more efficacious (high affinity) and with less side effects (high selectivity).

Our long term objective is to achieve a leadership position in the field, based on systematic, large-scale investigation of animal venoms, and correlated with the selection of molecular targets involved in important human pathologies such as pain, cancer or central nervous system diseases.