Spanish and Mexican Researchers Create a Drug to Fight Obesity Nicole Akoukou Thompson - Latin Post
go to original November 11, 2014

Breast cancer may be linked to obesity, according to a recent study published by the Cancer Prevention Institute of California; and researchers from numerous universities believe they've had a scientific breakthrough that would bring an end to obesity.

Spanish and Mexican researchers have identified the specific molecule in a protein/protease that prevents the generation of fat cells. Those researchers committed 18 months to the creation of a drug to fight obesity. The timing is impeccable, as two new studies have just unveiled that obesity increases the risk of particular types of breast cancer in African-American and Hispanic women, especially if they're postmenopausal.

The National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), the Autonomous Metropolitan University (UAM), the National Institute of Genomic Medicine (IMEGEN) and Landsteiner Scientific Laboratory with the Spanish subsidiary Neopharm Obesity officials collaborated to identify the protein "responsible" for obesity to develop a molecule that inhibits it. The computer design for the potential drugs will be carried out in Mexico and the synthesis and study of clinical participants will be performed in Spain. That laboratory also focuses on hypertension, Alzheimer's, cancer and Parkinson's, among other diseases. The protease research is still in its preclinical stage, but it's promising for the non-white population.

"Obesity is one of the major problems that we will 'attack' with the use of genomic medicine. There are already companies developing medicines for the Caucasian population, [so we're] focusing the study to Latinos," Francisco Kuri Brena, director of new developments from the laboratory, said to Science Daily.

Read the rest at Latin Post

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