Other Diseases

Researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have managed to synthesise lung surfactant, a drug used in the care of preterm babies, by mimicking the production of spider silk. Animal studies reveal it to be just as effective as the biological drugs currently in clinical use. Surfactant revolutionised the care of preterm babies by reducing the surface tension in their pulmonary alveoli and allowing them to be inflated at the moment of birth. Curosurf, the most globally widespread drug, was developed by scientists at Karolinska Institutet in the 1970s and 1980s. The drug is produced by the isolation of proteins from pig lungs, a process that is expensive, complicated a...