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Open access
Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, volume 45, issue 8, pages 1712-1722

A Common Mechanism Underlying Promiscuous Inhibitors from Virtual and High-Throughput Screening

McGovern Susan L. 1
Caselli Emilia 1
Grigorieff Nikolaus 1
1
 
Department of Molecular Pharmacology and Biological Chemistry, Northwestern University, 303 East Chicago Avenue, Chicago, Illinois 60611, and Howard Hughes Medical Institute, W. M. Keck Institute for Cellular Visualization, Rosenstiel Basic Medical Research Center, Brandeis University, 415 South Street, Waltham, Massachusetts 02454
Publication typeJournal Article
Publication date2002-03-09
Quartile SCImago
Q1
Quartile WOS
Q1
Impact factor7.3
ISSN00222623, 15204804
Drug Discovery
Molecular Medicine
Abstract
High-throughput and virtual screening are widely used to discover novel leads for drug design. On examination, many screening hits appear non-drug-like: they act noncompetitively, show little relationship between structure and activity, and have poor selectivity. Attempts to develop these peculiar molecules into viable leads are often futile, and much time can be wasted on the characterization of these "phony" hits. Despite their common occurrence, the mechanism of action of these promiscuous molecules remains unknown. To investigate this problem, 45 diverse screening hits were studied. Fifteen of these were previously reported as inhibitors of various receptors, including beta-lactamase, malarial protease, dihydrofolate reductase, HIV Tar RNA, thymidylate synthase, kinesin, insulin receptor, tyrosine kinases, farnesyltransferase, gyrase, prions, triosephosphate isomerase, nitric oxide synthase, phosphoinositide 3-kinase, and integrase; 30 were from an in-house screening library of a major pharmaceutical company. In addition to their original targets, 35 of these 45 compounds were shown to inhibit several unrelated model enzymes. These 35 screening hits included compounds, such as fullerenes, dyes, and quercetin, that have repeatedly shown activity against diverse targets. When tested against the model enzymes, the compounds showed time-dependent but reversible inhibition that was dramatically attenuated by albumin, guanidinium, or urea. Surprisingly, increasing the concentration of the model enzymes 10-fold largely eliminated inhibition, despite a 1000-fold excess of inhibitor; a well-behaved competitive inhibitor did not show this behavior. One model to explain these observations was that the active form of the promiscuous inhibitors was an aggregate of many individual molecules. To test this hypothesis, light scattering and electron microscopy experiments were performed. The nonspecific inhibitors were observed to form particles of 30-400 nm diameter by both techniques. In control experiments, a well-behaved competitive inhibitor and an inactive dye-like molecule were not observed to form aggregates. Consistent with the hypothesis that the aggregates are the inhibitory species, the particle size and IC(50) values of the promiscuous inhibitors varied monotonically with ionic strength; a competitive inhibitor was unaffected by changes in ionic strength. Unexpectedly, aggregate formation appears to explain the activity of many nonspecific inhibitors and may account for the activity of many promiscuous screening hits. Molecules acting via this mechanism may be widespread in drug discovery screening databases. Recognition of these compounds may improve screening results in many areas of pharmaceutical interest.

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McGovern S. L. et al. A Common Mechanism Underlying Promiscuous Inhibitors from Virtual and High-Throughput Screening // Journal of Medicinal Chemistry. 2002. Vol. 45. No. 8. pp. 1712-1722.
GOST all authors (up to 50) Copy
McGovern S. L., Caselli E., Grigorieff N., Shoichet B. A Common Mechanism Underlying Promiscuous Inhibitors from Virtual and High-Throughput Screening // Journal of Medicinal Chemistry. 2002. Vol. 45. No. 8. pp. 1712-1722.
RIS |
Cite this
RIS Copy
TY - JOUR
DO - 10.1021/jm010533y
UR - https://doi.org/10.1021%2Fjm010533y
TI - A Common Mechanism Underlying Promiscuous Inhibitors from Virtual and High-Throughput Screening
T2 - Journal of Medicinal Chemistry
AU - McGovern, Susan L.
AU - Caselli, Emilia
AU - Grigorieff, Nikolaus
AU - Shoichet, Brian
PY - 2002
DA - 2002/03/09 00:00:00
PB - American Chemical Society (ACS)
SP - 1712-1722
IS - 8
VL - 45
SN - 0022-2623
SN - 1520-4804
ER -
BibTex |
Cite this
BibTex Copy
@article{2002_McGovern,
author = {Susan L. McGovern and Emilia Caselli and Nikolaus Grigorieff and Brian Shoichet},
title = {A Common Mechanism Underlying Promiscuous Inhibitors from Virtual and High-Throughput Screening},
journal = {Journal of Medicinal Chemistry},
year = {2002},
volume = {45},
publisher = {American Chemical Society (ACS)},
month = {mar},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1021%2Fjm010533y},
number = {8},
pages = {1712--1722},
doi = {10.1021/jm010533y}
}
MLA
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MLA Copy
McGovern, Susan L., et al. “A Common Mechanism Underlying Promiscuous Inhibitors from Virtual and High-Throughput Screening.” Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, vol. 45, no. 8, Mar. 2002, pp. 1712-1722. https://doi.org/10.1021%2Fjm010533y.
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