The discovery of novel, potent and highly selective inhibitors of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS).

By careful analysis of experimental X-ray ligand crystallographic protein data across several inhibitor series we have discovered a novel, potent and selective series of iNOS inhibitors exemplified by compound 8.

Anchored plasticity opens doors for selective inhibitor design in nitric oxide synthase.

Nitric oxide synthase (NOS) enzymes synthesize nitric oxide, a signal for vasodilatation and neurotransmission at low concentrations and a defensive cytotoxin at higher concentrations. The high active site conservation among all three NOS isozymes hinders the design of selective NOS inhibitors to treat inflammation, arthritis, stroke, septic shock and cancer. Our crystal structures and mutagenesis results identified an isozyme-specific induced-fit binding mode linking a cascade of conformational changes to a new specificity pocket.

P2T purinoceptor antagonists. A QSAR study of some 2-substituted ATP analogues.

FPL67085MX represents the first in a class of novel, highly potent and selective P2T purinoceptor antagonists which are inhibitors of adenosine diphosphate (ADP)-induced platelet aggregation in-vitro. In an early series of compounds we studied the effect of variation of the adenine 2-substituent on potency and derived quantitative structure-activity relationships (QSARs) between the properties of the molecules and their biological activity. This work has recently been revisited using comparative molecular-field analysis (CoMFA) and the comparison of the predictions from the two methods is discussed along with their relative merits in terms of compound design.

The use of the GRID program in the 3-D QSAR analysis of a series of calcium-channel agonists.

The use of GRID in the 3-D QSAR analysis of a series of calcium-channel agonists is described. Partial least-squares analysis of GRID maps showing the interaction energy between an alkyl hydroxyl probe and a series of agonists in 3-D space generated a predictive quantitative model of the variation of biological activity. The macroscopic descriptors CLOGP and CMR were included in the analysis, and the importance of appropriate block scaling is highlighted.