The information on this site is intended for healthcare professionals in the United States and is not intended for the general public.
The information on this site is intended for healthcare professionals in the United States and is not intended for the general public.
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By December 1988, the Merck team had developed a three-dimensional image of the structure of HIV protease, which helped the drug’s designers to pinpoint the best area of attack. The 3-D model was a crucial step forward, and the model was quickly published in the scientific journal Nature in February 1989. Unfortunately, one of the program’s greatest champions did not live to see the publication.
On December 21, 1988, the team suffered a terrible setback. Irving Sigal, Merck’s senior director of molecular biology, and the impetus behind Merck’s entry into HIV protease inhibitor research, was killed returning from London on board the ill-fated Pan Am flight 103, which was blown up by a terrorist bomb over Lockerbie, Scotland.
After Sigal’s sudden, tragic death, the remaining Merck scientists met to decide the fate of the project. Led by Emini and Joel Huff, a chemist on the project, the team pledged to finish what Sigal had started — to develop a drug that might finally give the world a fighting chance in managing AIDS.
