Hevener Laboratory, University of Tennessee - College of Pharmacy

11/14/2025

Congratulations to Kristiana and Osama (grad student, postdoc) on their co-authored manuscript on F. nucleatum FabK biochemical and structural analysis. This enzyme is a narrow-spectrum antibacterial target for treatment of periodontal disease while avoiding oral microbiome disruption. Special thanks to our collaborators at Texas A&M and University of Hawaii at Hilo for their contributions, and to several PharmD students who assisted in the studies and were listed as contributing authors. Well done!

06/12/2025

Excellent perspective article on target engagement in this issue of J Med Chem.

In target-based drug discovery, quantification of target engagement is required to build structure–activity relationships and develop a potent clinical candidate. Target engagement data also provides evidence of a drug’s mechanism of action (MoA) which although is not required for approval, can ...

05/15/2025

Congratulations to the Palmer Lab at University of Tennessee Health Science Center College of Pharmacy on their recent publication in Cell Chemical Biology. We were happy to be a part of this exciting research!

Fungal infections affect millions of people each year, and the current antifungal armament is inadequate. Regan et al. have demonstrated that pantothenate kinase (PanK) is a valid target for antifungal development. In addition, they report a fungal-selective PanK inhibitor with in vivo antifungal ac...

03/26/2025

02/03/2025

Discover the world’s best science and medicine | Nature.com

01/22/2025

Thanks, Kristiana!

“Empowering, supportive, and passionate,” is how University of Tennessee Health Science Center PhD candidate Kristiana Avad described her marvelous mentor, U...

12/17/2024

This caps an outstanding year for the Hevener Lab and our collaborators. We're grateful for this support from the NIH.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has awarded $3.7 million to Kirk Hevener, PharmD, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center College of Pharmacy, for a project to develop new treatments for Clos...

12/11/2024

Key FDA approvals in 2024

2024 authorizations kept a steady clip and gave people some new treatment options

03/07/2024

Congrats to Hevener Lab graduate student, Fahad Pavel, on his first author publication in Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications - "Biophysical library screening using a Thermo-FMN assay to identify and characterize Clostridioides difficile FabK inhibitors"!

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbrc.2024.149740

01/05/2024

55 new therapeutics approved in 2023 - here's a nice review in Nature Reviews Drug Discovery. Of interest to the I.D. community are:

Cidara (Rezafungin, candidiasis)
Entasis (Sulbactam/Durlobactam ABC pneumonia)
Paxlovid (Nirmatrelvir/Rotonavir, COVID)
Beyfortus (Nirsevimab, RSV).

The FDA approved 55 novel therapeutics in 2023, the second highest count in the past 30 years.

06/13/2023

Congratulations to Julian Hurdle and his laboratory at Texas A&M Health Science Center on his recently accepted publication in Nature Communications titled "Decoding a cryptic mechanism of metronidazole resistance among globally disseminated fluoroquinolone resistant Clostridioides difficile". The Hevener laboratory is grateful to have been able to contribute to this excellent work.

06/08/2023

Discover the world’s best science and medicine | Nature.com