Many of today’s medicines trace their roots back to nature.
Aspirin, for example, comes from a chemical found in willow tree bark.
Now, new research suggests that a molecule found in guava plants could one day help in the battle against liver-related cancers, which are among the deadliest cancers worldwide.
A team led by William Chain, an associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry at the University of Delaware, has developed a way to create these special guava-based molecules in the lab.
The process, known as natural product total synthesis, allows scientists to build complex natural molecules step by step using widely available chemicals.
Their results were recently published in the journal Angewandte Chemie.
This breakthrough is important because while natural products often form the basis of powerful medicines, they are usually found in very small amounts in plants. That makes them difficult and expensive to harvest on a large scale.
By figuring out a synthetic “recipe,” Chain’s team has opened the door for other scientists to produce these cancer-fighting molecules more easily and at a much lower cost.
“The majority of medicines we use today either come directly from natural products or are inspired by them,” Chain explained. “The problem is, there aren’t enough natural resources to meet the demand for treatments. What we’ve done is create a pathway so chemists anywhere can follow our recipe and make these molecules themselves.”
Liam O’Grady, a doctoral student in Chain’s lab and the study’s first author, compared their work to blazing a new trail through unknown territory. “We are the first ones to pave that road, and now others can come along, refine it, and even find shortcuts,” he said. “That’s the exciting part—we’ve shown the pathway can be done.”
The potential medical impact is huge. Cases of liver and bile duct cancers, particularly hepatocellular carcinoma, have been rising worldwide. About one in 125 people globally is projected to face liver cancer during their lifetime.
In the United States, the outlook is grim: five-year survival rates for advanced cases remain below 15 percent. By 2025, more than 42,000 Americans are expected to be diagnosed with liver cancer, and over 30,000 will die from it. Current chemotherapy treatments are not only costly but also limited in effectiveness.
By providing a reliable way to make these guava-derived molecules, the Delaware team hopes to fuel new research and eventually new therapies that could save lives and reduce costs. The group is already working with the National Cancer Institute to explore whether the guava molecule might also be effective against other types of cancers.
For now, the discovery stands as an important example of how looking to nature—and then applying clever chemistry—can inspire the medicines of tomorrow.
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