A team of researchers has found a quicker and more efficient way to create nucleoside analogues, a type of small molecule that can be used in treatments for everything from cancer to viral diseases.
"Nucleoside analogues are among the most important molecules to the advancement of modern medicine," says Michael Meanwell, assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry and corresponding author of a paper published in Nature Communications describing the new process.
"They're used as antivirals, as cancer therapeutics, in gene therapy. The first two drugs brought to market for treating COVID-19 were both nucleoside analogues."
