Tuberculosis, an Old Disease Lacking New Therapeutic Drugs

Abstract

Tuberculosis is a neglected disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Some evidence suggests its existence since thousands of years and today it still represents a public health problem. Current treatment presents serious problems such as adverse effects, high cost, long term, besides the emergence of resistant strains. Therefore the search for new antimicrobials is still in need. In this work we reviewed tuberculosis treatment as well as the synthesis of the current drugs and new synthetic derivatives that have been developed against M. tuberculosis. In this context we explored the medicinal chemistry and molecular modeling strategies as important tools to guide the rational design and synthesis of novel chemotherapeutic agents for use in tuberculosis. Keywords: Antimicrobial, medicinal chemistry, Mycobaterium tuberculosis, resistance, topoisomerase inhibitors, tuberculosis.