New Strategies and Approaches in Polypharmacology
A special issue of Molecules (ISSN 1420-3049). This special issue belongs to the section "Medicinal Chemistry".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 July 2024) | Viewed by 9845
Special Issue Editors
Interests: medicinal chemistry; drug discovery; chemical synthesis; polypharmacology; multitarget ligands; anticancer agents; sigma receptor ligands; HO-1 inhibitors; 5-HT7 receptor ligands
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: sigma-1 receptor; sigma-2 receptor; opioid; chemical synthesis; drug discovery
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Almost twenty years ago polypharmacology has emerged as a new paradigm in drug discovery by overcoming the key concept of the “magic bullet” which dominated the medicinal chemistry scene for decades. Undoubtedly, the “one-molecule, one target” approach came up with successful blockbuster drugs which led to a significant increase in the quality of life. On the other hand, many of the current unmet medical needs are represented by multifactorial diseases, such as neurodegenerative and psychiatric disorders, metabolic diseases, infectious diseases, and cancer, which are caused by complex biochemical pathways dysregulation. In light of this, the combination of drugs (polypharmacy) is often essential to enhance therapeutic efficacy or delayed resistance development. Alternatively, polypharmacological agents (also known as multitarget-directed ligands or MTDLs), which are designed to act on multiple targets or disease pathways, offer a variety of advantages to overcome general issues associated with the co-administration of two or more agents. Unfortunately, the development of multitargeting compounds requires more complex and time-consuming steps than a “standard” drug. These phases include the identification of suitable target combinations, the multiple targeting ligand identification and optimization, and the validation of test systems to multitarget ligand characterization. As a result, the rational design of polypharmacology is highly challenging and still required new strategies and technologies to easily access novel drugs belonging to this class.
To that end, this Special Issue aims to collect original research, short communications, and review articles concerning advancements in the design and synthesis of novel polypharmacological agents, especially those that highlight new strategies and approaches are welcome.
Dr. Sebastiano Intagliata
Dr. Agostino Marrazzo
Guest Editors
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Keywords
- polypharmacology
- hybrid compounds
- multitarget ligands
- conjugate derivatives
- drug design
- drug development
- chemical synthesis
- multifactorial diseases
- cancer
- pain
- neurodegenerative disorders
- psychiatric disorders
- metabolic diseases
- infectious diseases
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