Heroes and Cultural Identity Project

SCE Heroes - William Fenical

DRUGS FROM THE SEA

WILLIAM FENICAL Ph.D.

by Craig Wood

In this current age the need for new antibiotics is approaching a critical stage. The resources we have on land have been tested on again and again by the pharmaceutical industry and by biochemists all over the world.

William Finical a marine biologist from the U.S asked "Why don't we research for bacteria in our seas?" A good question I think but no authority would answer the question or agree that it was a valid question.

The truth is nobody had asked the question before.

William Fenical was not the first man to research our oceans but he was a part of a team who did discover new antibiotics purely from our seas. We currently use over 100 drugs today that this man has extracted from the marine world, and more than 4,000 strains of unique DNA have been isolated for further research.

Current drugs William fenical has played a major role in developing include:

• pseudopterosins from the soft coral Pseudopterogorgia which have anti-inflammatory properties. The licensing rights have been sold to the Estee Lauder Company which developed a series of popular skin care products based on them called Resilience.
  
  
• More recently Fenical has developed two other cancer fighting drugs Halimide which enters a tumours blood vessels causing them to collapse therefore removing the blood flow and killing the tumour, and Salinosporamide A which targets small enzymes in the middle of the cell and inhibits there functions dramatically.

William has been in every corner of the globe from the Atlantic to the Pacific and the Indian oceans and is still to this day looking for that miracle antibiotic. Not everyone has heard of William Fenical but by tomorrow more people will, because this man will discover that wonder drug that we need, if he hasn't already.

Craig Wood is a science student following a one year university access course in biological sciences.