Bipiperidinyl carboxylic acid amides as potent, selective, and functionally active CCR4 antagonists.

A cell-based assay for the chemokine G-protein-coupled receptor CCR4 was developed, and used to screen a small-molecule compound collection in a multiplex format. A series of bipiperidinyl carboxylic acid amides amenable to parallel chemistry were derived that were potent and selective antagonists of CCR4. One prototype compound was shown to be active in a functional model of chemotaxis, making it a useful chemical tool to explore the role of CCR4 in asthma, allergy, diabetes, and cancer.

Multiplexed G-protein-coupled receptor Ca2+ flux assays for high-throughput screening.

An early drug discovery approach focusing on gene families can benefit from strategies that exploit common signaling mechanisms to more effectively identify and characterize novel chemical lead structures. Multiplexing, defined as the screening of multiple targets within the same experiment, is an example of this strategy. Here, the authors describe a technique that allows multiplexing of a common assay type used to study G-protein-coupled receptors: changes in intracellular Ca2+ levels as measured by Molecular Device's fluorometric imaging plate reader (FLIPR).

3-(2-carboxyethyl)-4,6-dichloro-1H-indole-2-carboxylic acid: an allosteric inhibitor of fructose-1,6-bisphosphatase at the AMP site.

3-(2-Carboxyethyl)-4,6-dichloro-1H-indole-2-carboxylic acid (MDL-29951), an antagonist of the glycine site of the NMDA receptor, has been found to be an allosteric inhibitor of the enzyme fructose 1,6-bisphosphatase. The compound binds at the AMP regulatory site by X-ray crystallography. This represents a new approach to inhibition of fructose 1,6-bisphosphatase and serves as a lead for further drug design.

Anilinoquinazoline inhibitors of fructose 1,6-bisphosphatase bind at a novel allosteric site: synthesis, in vitro characterization, and X-ray crystallography.

The synthesis and in vitro structure-activity relationships (SAR) of a novel series of anilinoquinazolines as allosteric inhibitors of fructose-1,6-bisphosphatase (F16Bpase) are reported. The compounds have a different SAR as inhibitors of F16Bpase than anilinoquinazolines previously reported. Selective inhibition of F16Bpase can be attained through the addition of appropriate polar functional groups at the quinazoline 2-position, thus separating the F16Bpase inhibitory activity from the epidermal growth factor receptor tyrosine kinase inhibitory activity previously observed with similar structures.