Promising novel compounds for the generation of new anti-HIV-RT therapeutic drugs

The recent literature has highlighted several classes of antiretrovirals used as powerful weapons against AIDS. Current antiretrovirals include drugs that act as inhibitors of integrase, protease or even the fusion entry step of HIV-1. However, reverse transcriptase remains an attractive target for new anti-HIV-1 drug design. The clinical base already established and relatively low cytotoxicity support reverse transcriptase inhibitors as an important field of research and also a fruitful source of potentially new antiretrovirals. The goal of this article is to provide an overview of some recently approved drugs and drug candidates, which are endowed with novel mechanisms of action, and to discuss new approaches that may be an alternative to clinically available reverse transcriptase inhibitors. Some of these drugs are promising options for future treatments against multiresistant HIV-1 strains found in treatment-experienced patients.