Deuterated drug

The concept of replacing hydrogen with deuterium is an example of bioisosterism, whereby similar biological effects to a known drug are produced in an analog designed to confer superior properties.

[21] The company Retrotope discovered and has been developing a deuterated fatty acid RT001 as a treatment for neurodegenerative diseases such as Friedreich's ataxia and infantile neuroaxonal dystrophy.

Their premise is that fatty acids in cell membranes are a source of reactive oxygen species and deuterated versions will be less prone to generating them.

[22][23] Poxel SA, a French clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on therapies for rare metabolic diseases, is developing PXL065 to target nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH).

The company acquired PXL065 (the deuterium-stabilized (R)-enantiomer of pioglitazone) and a portfolio of deuterated thiazolidinediones (TZDs) from DeuteRx, LLC, in 2018,[24] and published positive results from the Phase 2 trial in March 2023.

Chemical structures of ethyl linoleate — natural (top) and its deuterated version 11,11-D 2 -ethyl linoleate . Protium hydrogen atoms (H) are explicitly shown where they are replaced with deuterium atoms (D).