Jewn Giew Park | PubMed Health

PubMed2005

Serotype-selective, small-molecule inhibitors of the zinc endopeptidase of botulinum neurotoxin serotype A.

Botulinum neurotoxin serotype A (BoNTA) is one of the most toxic substances known. Currently, there is no antidote to BoNTA. Small molecules identified from high-throughput screening reportedly inhibit the endopeptidase--the zinc-bound, catalytic domain of BoNTA--at a drug concentration of 20 microM. However, optimization of these inhibitors is hampered by challenges including the computational evaluation of the ability of a zinc ligand to compete for coordination with nearby residues in the active site of BoNTA. No improved inhibitor of the endopeptidase has been reported. This article reports the development of a serotype-selective, small-molecule inhibitor of BoNTA with a K(i) of 12 microM. This inhibitor was designed to coordinate the zinc ion embedded in the active site of the enzyme for affinity and to interact with a species-specific residue in the active site for selectivity. It is the most potent small-molecule inhibitor of BoNTA reported to date. The results suggest that multiple molecular dynamics simulations using the cationic dummy atom approach are useful to structure-based design of zinc protease inhibitors.

Botulinum Toxins, Type A↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Improved loading and cleavage methods for solid-phase synthesis using chlorotrityl resins: synthesis and testing of a library of 144 discrete chemicals as potential farnesyltransferase inhibitors.

The use of chlorotrityl resins for the immobilization of amines is sometimes deterred by the lengthy process of loading the reactants on the resins and product decomposition caused by the reactive chlorotrityl group in the presence of 1% TFA as a cleavage agent. Here, we report improved methods developed for selective and efficient loading of aminobenzoic acid derivatives on chlorotrityl resins and for cleavage of aniline-containing products from the resins without decomposition. These methods led to the synthesis of a library of 144 discrete chemicals as potential farnesyltransferase inhibitors (FTIs) using IRORI's radio-frequency-encoded sorting technique and to the study of the applicability of the bivalence approach to the development of FTIs.

Amino Acids↗