Major Funding Boost for Combating Fungal Infections

An international research collaboration, including Macquarie University’s Associate Professor Amy Cain, has received €1 million to tackle the growing global crisis of antifungal resistance. This escalating healthcare challenge is driven by factors such as climate change, the overuse of antifungals and a lack of new treatments.

The initiative, Revitalising the Antifungal Pipeline with Transition Metals (RAFT), is funded by the Joint Programming Initiative on Antimicrobial Resistance (JPIAMR). This international platform brings together 29 countries and the European Commission to combat antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Associate Professor Cain, representing Australia through the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC), plays a key role in the project.

Addressing a Global Crisis

Antifungal resistance is a critical and growing threat, endangering millions of lives annually as existing treatments lose their effectiveness. Meanwhile, progress in developing new antifungal drugs has stagnated. The RAFT project seeks to reinvigorate this field by exploring transition metal complexes—a largely untapped group of compounds that have shown greater efficacy against fungi than traditional organic molecules, without increased toxicity.

Leading the project is Dr Angelo Frei from the University of York. The RAFT team is pioneering the study of these “Lego-like” molecules, in which functional groups are arranged around a central metal ion. These compounds have already shown promise as antimicrobial agents and could represent a breakthrough in the fight against drug-resistant fungal infections.

Innovative Testing and Techniques

Associate Professor Cain will utilise the Macquarie University’s Galleria Research Facility, where she will evaluate these compounds using the wax moth as an ethical animal model. ‘This approach allows us to test the effectiveness of these antifungal drugs in a sustainable and humane way,’ she explains.

The project will employ cutting-edge methods, including combinatorial synthesis, automation and machine learning, to design and test approximately 4000 new metal complexes. By integrating expertise across inorganic chemistry, machine learning, antifungal screening and preclinical evaluation, RAFT is uniquely positioned to transform promising laboratory findings into clinical solutions.

If successful, the RAFT project could deliver the first-ever metal-based antifungal drug, offering hope to millions of people worldwide who are vulnerable to drug-resistant fungal infections.

“This project represents a bold step forward in antifungal drug discovery, with the potential to address a significant unmet medical need,” says Associate Professor Cain.