What was Gertrude Elion's theory on rational drug design?
My central tenet was understanding the unique biochemistry of diseased cells or organisms and then designing drugs to exploit those differences. We weren't just shooting in the dark; we were armed with knowledge of metabolic pathways, particularly purine and pyrimidine metabolism. For instance, we knew that rapidly dividing cells, like cancer cells or pathogens, often have altered requirements for building blocks of DNA and RNA. If we could design a molecule that mimicked these building blocks but was faulty, it could be incorporated into the nucleic acids, thereby inhibiting cell growth. This principle of 'selective toxicity' was paramount—hitting the target without harming the host.
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