Identification of potent inhibitors of the sortilin-progranulin interaction

  • Bioorg Med Chem Lett. 2020 Sep 1;30(17):127403. doi: 10.1016/j.bmcl.2020.127403.
Shawn J Stachel  1 Anthony T Ginnetti  2 Scott A Johnson  3 Paige Cramer  4 Yi Wang  5 Marina Bukhtiyarova  5 Daniel Krosky  5 Craig Stump  2 Danielle M Hurzy  2 Kelly-Ann Schlegel  2 Andrew J Cooke  2 Samantha Allen  5 Gregory O'Donnell  6 Michael Ziebell  6 Gopal Parthasarathy  3 Krista L Getty  6 Thu Ho  6 Yangsi Ou  5 Aneta Jovanovska  5 Steve S Carroll  5 Mark Pausch  5 Kevin Lumb  6 Scott D Mosser  5 Bhavya Voleti  4 Daniel J Klein  3 Stephen M Soisson  3 Celina Zerbinatti  4 Paul J Coleman  2
Affiliations
  • 1. Department of Medicinal Chemistry, Merck & Co. Inc., PO Box 4, West Point, PA 19486, USA. Electronic address: [email protected].
  • 2. Department of Medicinal Chemistry, Merck & Co. Inc., PO Box 4, West Point, PA 19486, USA.
  • 3. Department of Chemistry and Structural Chemistry, Merck & Co. Inc., PO Box 4, West Point, PA 19486, USA.
  • 4. Department of Neuroscience, Merck & Co. Inc., PO Box 4, West Point, PA 19486, USA.
  • 5. Department of Pharmacology, Merck & Co. Inc., PO Box 4, West Point, PA 19486, USA.
  • 6. Screening and Protein Science, Merck & Co. Inc., PO Box 4, West Point, PA 19486, USA.
Abstract

High-throughput screening methods have been used to identify two novel series of inhibitors that disrupt progranulin binding to sortilin. Exploration of structure-activity relationships (SAR) resulted in compounds with sufficient potency and physicochemical properties to enable co-crystallization with sortilin. These co-crystal structures supported observed SAR trends and provided guidance for additional avenues for designing compounds with additional interactions within the binding site.

Keywords
Progranulin; Protein-protein interaction inhibitor; Sortilin; Structure activity relationship.
Products