Sobhani, et al.
fects, but is generally not the first drug choice due to the extremely painful side effects it can cause. It is primarily used in poverty-stricken countries and in extreme circumstances. Docetaxel is used in the treatment against multiple cancers, including but not limited to, breast cancer, lung cancer, stomach cancer, head and neck cancer, and prostate cancer. Before the administration of this drug, a corticosteroid pill is given in hope of reducing the fluid retention and allergic reactions.There is no pill form of Docetaxel and it is thus administered intravenously. Antibiotics are antibacterial agents that treat infections caused by bacteria. Antibiotics kill bacteria by inhibiting bacterial growth and can have a number of mechanisms including disrupting the formation of cell walls, disrupting the function of DNA, and preventing proteins from functioning properly. There are over one hundred antibiotics on the market today; they are amongst the most frequently prescribed medications in modern medicine. One of the most well-known antibiotics is Penicillin or Penicillin G (Table 1). It was discovered in 1928, by a Scottish biologist named Alexander Fleming. He discovered penicillin by accident when he was cleaning his lab and noticed one of his experiments looked suspicious. There was mold in the petri dish with no bacteria surrounding it. Upon further research, he concluded that the mold contained lysozymes that would eliminate or at the very least repel the bacteria. Fleming found penicillin to be the first effective antibiotic drug against many serious bacteria such as staphylococci and streptococci. Another antibiotic is Amikacin (Table 1), which works by binding to the 30S ribosomal subunit. It then inhibits protein synthesis to prevent the initiation complex of the messenger RNA. This misleads the mRNA allowing the incorrect amino acids to be inserted into the polypeptide, which causes the bacteria to be unable to synthesize proteins. Capreomycin8 (Table 1) is an important drug used in the treatment of muldrug
8. Li HQ, Lv PC, Yan T, and Zhu HL. "Urea derivatives as anticancer agents." Anticancer Agents Med Chem 9.4 (2009): 471-480. PubMed. Web. 11 Dec. 2012.
154