By Liz Highleyman

Drugs that attack the hepatitis C virus (HCV) directly—dubbed specifically-targeted antiviral therapy for hepatitis C, or “STAT-C”—represent a paradigm shift in the management of the disease.

The current standard of care for chronic hepatitis C treatment, pegylated interferon plus ribavirin, works by stimulating the body’s immune response against the virus. Interferons are natural chemical messengers (cytokines) that regulate immune function. Ribavirin, an IMPDH inhibitor (Inosine monophosphate dehydrogenase), has the ability to inhibit viral replication by interfering with ribonucleic acid (RNA) production, but in practice appears to work primarily as an immune modulator.

Several new anti-HCV drugs now in development work another way—by blocking or interfering with specific steps in viral replication. In order to understand the potential of these novel agents, it is useful to look at the HCV life cycle and various ways it can be disrupted.

(RTTNews) - Achillion Pharmaceuticals Inc. ( ACHN | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) is scheduled to host a Corporate and Clinical Update conference call on Monday, February 1, highlighting the company's progress in its pipeline of HCV drugs. The company will also provide an update on its partnering efforts related to its antibiotic candidate ACH-702 as well as its HIV product candidate Elvucitabine.

Achillion's product pipeline includes ACH-1625 and ACH-1095 for the treatment of chronic hepatitis C infection; ACH-702 for the treatment of serious, resistant bacterial infections and Elvucitabine for the treatment of HIV.

ACH-1625, a potent HCV inhibitor, is under phase I study. The preliminary results of a phase Ib study of ACH-1625 reported early this month showed that there is a dramatic reduction in viral load after 5 days of monotherapy and continued suppression of viral load after drug discontinuation.

Howard Hughes Medical Institute researchers and their colleagues at the Rockefeller University have developed a new method for growing human liver cells outside the body. Using the new cell culture system, scientists can now study hepatitis C virus in the lab over a period of weeks – which may boost efforts to develop a vaccine or broadly effective treatment for the infection. Until now, scientists working on hepatitis C vaccine design have been hampered by the lack of an animal model or a culture system that could support long-term study of viral infection.