[New strategies for drug development].

The strategy how new drugs are being developed has dramatically changed during the last decade. Until then a rational, target-aimed design of drugs was not possible, because the molecular basis of disease was largely unexplored. The progress in basic science has revealed that many diseases are caused by the malfunction of proteins. These proteins are targets for drugs, which should bind to the protein and inhibit its function. Knowledge of the three dimensional structure of the target protein is helpful to find binding pockets for the drug on the molecular surface. The strategy of this knowledge-based or structure-based drug-design is explained with the help of several examples for recently approved drugs, antivirals against influenza and AIDS, and a drug against a rare cancer, chronic myeloic leukemia.