Bleomycin

Bleomycin is a glycopeptide antibiotic used as a chemotherapy medicine rather than for infection. It kills cancer cells by chelating metal ions, mostly iron, to form a reactive complex that reacts with oxygen and generates free radicals which break DNA strands apart. Doctors combine it with other chemotherapy drugs to treat Hodgkin lymphoma, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, testicular cancer, ovarian cancer and cervical cancer. The compound comes from the soil bacterium Streptomyces verticillus. Japanese scientist Hamao Umezawa discovered it in 1962 while screening bacterial culture filtrates for antitumor activity, publishing his findings in 1966. It was launched in Japan by Nippon Kayaku in 1969 and received United States approval in July 1973, and it is still sold under the brand name Blenoxane.