Tag: Featured

Tu Youyou’s Antimalarial Drug Discovery: From Ancient Text to Clinical Trials

In the 1960’s, the world was plagued with malaria, and drug resistance was rising. Tu Youyou, a pharmacologist in China, was put on a top secret task force to find a new cure. Her weapon of choice? A collection of ancient Chinese medicinal texts, including Ge Hong’s 2,000-year-old A Handbook of Prescriptions for Emergencies. It was a dark time in her country’s history. Her husband had been sent to a reeducation camp because like her, he was an academic. That meant he was trained in Western ideas that threatened the current regime. Perhaps Tu was even more dangerous to the […]