Melinta Therapeutics Updates Pyrrolocytosine and Enhanced Macrolide Programs at ECCMID Showcasing Company’s Structure-Based Drug Design

Melinta Therapeutics, a privately held company developing novel antibiotics to treat serious bacterial infections, announced today that collaborators of the company have been invited to make a presentation on the company’s development of a novel class of antibiotics called pyrrolocytosines during a moderated e-poster session. These compounds are based on a molecular scaffold that was rationally designed for high binding affinity to a site on the bacterial ribosome not exploited by other commercially available antimicrobials. By honing the scaffolds’ shapes and polarities, Melinta scientists have created hundreds of pyrrolocytosine compounds that demonstrate potent activity against Gram-negative bacteria, do not share cross-resistance with current therapies and – in their best examples – are not impacted by efflux, a major problem with resistant Gram-negative bacteria. Four exemplars from the class, with a range of expected activities, were profiled in the laboratory of Dr. David Livermore at the National Infection Service in Public Health England. Results from in vitro studies of these four compounds against several multi-drug resistant (MDR) bacterial isolates will be reviewed during an e-poster session by his colleague, Dr. Anna Vickers.