A genomic perspective on human proteases as drug targets

Of the similar to 400 known human proteases, similar to 14% are under investigation as drug targets. Although the total is certain to rise during the finishing phase of the human genome project, the initial annotation of the similar to 30,000 human proteome set includes similar to 500 proteases. Bioinformatic analysis can now be performed on complete human protease families and will soon include comparisons with mice and fish. New sequences will require evaluation of their function in normal physiology and human disease. By revealing details such as splice variants and population polymorphisms, genomic sequence information will have a central role in the validation of protease drug targets.