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Updated: Apr 7, 2026

Implementation of In Vitro Drug Resistance Assays: Maximizing the Potential for Uncovering Clinically Relevant Resistance Mechanisms
Published on: December 9, 2015
Evolutionary consequences of drug resistance: shared principles across diverse targets and organisms
Diarmaid Hughes1, Dan I Andersson1
1Uppsala University, Department of Medical Biochemistry and Microbiology, Biomedical Center, BOX 582S-75123, Uppsala, Sweden.
Abstract:
Drug therapy has a crucial role in the treatment of viral, bacterial, fungal and protozoan infections, as well as the control of human cancer. The success of therapy is being threatened by the increasing prevalence of resistance. We examine and compare mechanisms of drug resistance in these diverse biological systems (using HIV and Plasmodium falciparum as examples of viral and protozoan pathogens, respectively) and discuss how factors — such as mutation rates, fitness effects of resistance, epistasis and clonal interference — influence the evolutionary trajectories of drug-resistant clones. We describe commonalities and differences related to resistance development that could guide strategies to improve therapeutic effectiveness and the development of a new generation of drugs.
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