Desferal, iron overload diseases

Siderophores are iron-complexing compounds of low molecular weight that are synthesized by bacteria and fungi, and serve to deliver iron to the microbes. Because of their exclusive affinity and specificity for Fe3+, natural siderophores and synthetic derivatives have been exploited in the treatment of human iron-overload diseases. The most successfully used example is Desferal , which is the methane sulfonate derivative of iron-free ferrioxamine B, a linear trihydroxamate (Figure 3.2). Ferrioxamine was isolated in 1958 from the culture supernatant of Streptomyces... 

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