Department of Veterinary Medicine

Research in Veterinary Medicine

Other relevant links

• http://www.queens.cam.ac.uk

Research description

Research focuses on development and assessment of antiviral compounds, especially by using laboratory infection models to investigate the effects of antiviral agents on the pathogenesis of human and animal herpesviruses including neurological infections and latency and antiviral drug resistance. Interested in novel therapies for herpes simplex virus; presently focusing on the helicase/primase inhibitors and the effects of drug-resistance mutations in the helicase primase complex. A Former member of the Board of Directors of the International Society for Antiviral Research and President from 1994 to 1996. A founding editor for Antiviral Chemistry and Chemotherapy and, International Antiviral News. Currently Editor-in-Chief of Antiviral Chemistry and Chemotherapy and a Virology Editor of Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy. Serve on the Editorial Boards of several other virology journals.

Main collaborators

• Dr Stacey Efstathiou, Department of Pathology, Cambridge University
• Dr Alexander Birkmann, AiCuris, Wuppertal, Germany

Key publications since 2001

• Biswas, S., Kleymann, G., Swift, M.,Tiley, L., Lyall, J., Aguirre-Hernández, J. & Field, H.J. (2008). A single drug-resistance mutation in HSV-1 UL52 primase points to a difference between two helicase-primase inhibitors in their mode of interaction with the antiviral target. Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy. in press. (doi:10.1093/jac/dkn057).
• Field, H.J. & Vere Hodge, A. (2008). Antivirals In Encylopedia of Virology, Ed B.W. Mahy, pub. Elsevier, in press.
• Hussein, I.T.M.., Núñez Miguel, R.., Tiley, L.S. & Field, H.J. (2008). Substrate specificity and molecular modelling of the feline herpesvirus-1 thymidine kinase Archives of Virology, in press
• Hussain, I.T.M.., Menashy, R.V. & Field, H.J. (2008). Penciclovir is a potent inhibitor of feline herpesvirus-1 with susceptibility determined at the level of virus-encoded thymidine kinase. Antiviral Research, in press.
• Biswas, S., Smith, C., & Field, H.J. (2007). Detection of HSV-1 variants highly resistant to the helicase-primase inhibitor BAY 57-1293 at high frequency in two of ten recent clinical isolates of HSV-1. Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, 60, 274-79.
• Biswas, S, Swift, M. & Field, H.J. (2007). High frequency of spontaneous helicase primase inhibitor (BAY 57-1293) drug resistant variants in certain laboratory isolates of HSV-1. Antiviral Chemistry & Chemotherapy, 18, 13-23.
• Biswas, S., Jennens, L. & Field, H.J. (2007). Single amino acid substitutions in the HSV-1 helicase protein that confer resistance to the helicase-primase inhibitor BAY 57-1293 are associated with increased or decreased virus growth characteristics in tissue culture. Archives of Virology, 152, 1489-1500.
• Biswas, S., Jennens, L. & Field, H.J. (2007). The helicase primase inhibitor, BAY 57-1293 shows potent therapeutic antiviral activity superior to famciclovir in BALB/c mice infected with herpes simplex virus type 1. Antiviral Research, 75, 30-35.
• De Clercq, E. & Field, H.J. (2006). Antiviral prodrugs - the development of successful prodrug strategies for antiviral chemotherapy. British Journal Pharmacology, 147, 1-11.
• Field, H.J., Biswas, S. & Mohammad, I.T. (2006). Herpesvirus latency and therapy - From a veterinary perspective. Antiviral Research, 71, 127-133