Obesity-fighting drug developed
Updated on 04 November 2008
A drug that mimics the effects of a wonder ingredient in red wine has been developed to fight obesity and diabetes.
The compound, SRT1720, protected mice from weight gain and insulin disorders even when they ate a high-fat diet. It also enhanced their running ability.
The drug targets a protein called SIRT1 which is also affected by resveratrol, a chemical in the skins of red grapes that is believed to combat ageing and help prevent heart disease and cancer.
Resveratrol is found in red wine and may explain the "French paradox" - the fact that people in southern France have a low incidence of heart disease despite eating a lot of saturated fat.
Professor Johan Auwerx, from the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne in Switzerland, who led the tests of the new drug, said: "There has been a lot of controversy in the field about resveratrol action. We find that the majority of the biology of resveratrol can be ascribed to SIRT1."
Low doses of SRT1720 partially protected mice from gaining weight on a high fat diet after 10 weeks of treatment. At higher doses, the drug completely prevented weight gain in the animals. Blood sugar tolerance and insulin sensitivity - both linked to diabetes - were improved, and the animals became physically fitter.
"SIRT1720 made the animals run twice as long," said Prof Auwerx, whose research is reported in the journal Cell Metabolism. However the enhanced performance was only seen when researchers exercised the mice. Without forced exercise, their voluntary activity declined.
The drug appeared to fool the body into thinking that food was scarce. A similar response occurs with calorie restriction, which alters metabolism and causes the body to burn fat.
Prof Auwerx said: "These results show that new synthetic SIRT1 activators can reproduce the positive metabolic effects that were previously demonstrated using resveratrol, a naturally occurring SIRT1 activator found in red wine.
"But unlike resveratrol, these new chemical entities target only the SIRT1 pathway, making them more selective and potent for achieving these metabolic benefits."
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