Depok (May 14, 2019). Dr. Anom Bowolaksono, M.Sc., an academic from the Department of Biology, Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Indonesia, recently achieved an achievement by being selected as one of six top researchers who successfully received research funding through the Newton Fund research program between the Medical Research Council (MRC) and the Indonesian Ministry of Research, Technology, and Higher Education.
This was revealed by the Indonesian Minister of Research, Technology and Higher Education and the British Ambassador in a press conference on infectious disease research collaboration between the Indonesian government and the United Kingdom on Monday (13/5/2019) at Building D, Indonesian Ministry of Research, Technology and Higher Education, Jakarta.
In this international collaboration, the Indonesian Ministry of Research, Technology and Higher Education, together with the UK Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, has prepared funds amounting to IDR 37 billion to fund six top research projects in the field of infectious diseases for a period of three years.
To the FMIPA UI public relations team via Whatsapp message, Anom explained that he would collaborate with Dr. R. Tedjo Sasmono, Ph.D (Eijkman Institute for Molecular Biology), and a British researcher, Dr. Peter G. Barlow BSc (Hons) PhD (Research Group for School of Applied Science Edinburg Napier University), to complete a research project entitled “Cathelicidins As Novel Therapeutic Antivirals For Dengue Infection”.
In their research, he, Tedjo Sasmono, and Peter will test the cathelicidins molecules produced by the human immune system, to see whether these molecules can be modified to combat dengue fever.
Anom continued, explaining that the compound cathelicidin is a member of the host defense peptide group, possessing the strongest antiviral activity found in humans and other organisms. This research is a follow-up to the previously established immunomodulator cathelicidin’s excellent antiviral properties and its potential for use in treating dengue infections.
This research will be conducted over a period of three years, with the aim of determining the differential characterization of the effects of dengue virus infection expression, studying the induction of apoptosis targets with exogenous cathelicidins, and determining the potential of vitamin D and phenyl-butyrate to be used as additional treatments for viral infections through stimulation of endogenous cathelicidin expression.
The research series will begin with the process of isolating several related proteins, and conducting expression and validation tests. In the second year,autophagyinduction and regulation will be carried out and the activity of related proteins will be tested. In the final year, cathelicidins treatment for exogenous dengue virus infection will be tested.
He hopes that the cathelicidins compound, a candidate for antiviral treatment for the novel dengue virus, can be used as a method for treating dengue infections widely in the future.
