Search for new antimycotic agents: main trends and problems

The problem of treatment of mycotic infections today is still relevant. Etiotropic therapy is an essential component of the pharmacotherapy of mycoses. A general criterion for the effectiveness of the use of antimycotics is the disappearance of clinical and instrumental signs of infection, as well as the eradication of the pathogen from the lesion. The purpose of this review is to analyze the main directions of searching for new compounds (groups of compounds) with antifungal activity for practical medicine, and the most important problems arising from these studies. The main difficulties arising from these studies is the high economic cost of such projects: significant financial investments are accompanied by a possible limitation of the circulation of these drugs due to their introduction into the reserve, as well as the spread of resistant strains against the background of the short duration of patent protection. The article presents the most commonly used classification of antifungal agents and their main mechanism of action. The main strategies for the development of new antifungal agents are highlighted: reprofiling the existing drugs that were previously used for a different purpose; modification of the existing antifungal drugs to increase effectiveness and reduce toxicity; the creation of new antifungal molecules by chemical synthesis or the identification of agents of natural origin that have a detrimental effect on fungal microbiota. The review presents data on compounds of various origins exhibiting antimycotic activity, obtained and described in recent decades. The characteristic of the mechanism and the spectrum of their action is given. Substances with a traditional mechanism of action associated with the influence on the cell wall of fungi (effect on the ergosterol system, impaired synthesis of 1,3-b-D-glucan) join the molecules that block the exchange of sphingolipids of the fungal cell, disrupting the synthesis of chitin, protein metabolism, etc.

fungal cells, mycoses, antimycotics, classification, directions for the search for antifungal agents, pharmaceutical chemistry.

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