Targeted Covalent Inhibitors in Drug Discovery, Chemical Biology and Beyond
A special issue of Pharmaceuticals (ISSN 1424-8247). This special issue belongs to the section "Medicinal Chemistry".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (20 March 2023) | Viewed by 47964
Special Issue Editors
Interests: medicinal chemistry; chemical biology; drug design; covalent inhibitors; covalent warheads; protein kinases; chemical probes; target validation
Interests: medicinal chemistry; drug discovery; chemical probes; reversible and covalent kinase inhibitors; warhead development
Interests: medicinal chemistry; chemical biology; drug design; chemical probes; understudied kinases; kinase inhibitors; covalent inhibitors; warhead design; target validation
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Targeted covalent inhibitors (TCIs) have seen a resurgence in drug discovery and chemical biology. They offer a variety of benefits over classical, non-covalent targeting approaches, including an improved potency and a long duration of action. In addition to their advantages in therapeutic efficacy, TCIs can be exploited to tackle challenging targets, as has been impressively shown by the recent FDA approval of the first KRAS G12C inhibitor (Sotorasib). Addressing poorly conserved amino acids with suitable reactive groups, dubbed warheads, has further become an important strategy to promote selectivity, sometimes even between highly homologous proteins. In chemical biology, the establishment of a durable covalent link between a protein of interest and a chemical probe opens up ample opportunities for investigating the target’s biology. Significant advances in chemical proteomics have deepened our understanding of covalent ligand’s interactomes in complex biological systems. However, challenges such as a limited repertoire of warhead chemistries or the limited predictability of off-target effects and toxicities still need to be overcome. This Special Issue aims at providing an overview of the state of the art in the field of TCIs in a broader sense. In addition to the development of TCIs as chemical tools or drug candidates, it will also cover reviews and research articles on TCI warhead chemistries, chemoproteomic approaches facilitating TCI development, improved computational methods enabling TCI design, and chemical biology investigations employing specific covalent probes to interrogate biological systems.
Prof. Dr. Matthias Gehringer
Dr. Chiara Borsari
Dr. Ricardo Augusto Massarico Serafim
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Pharmaceuticals is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- targeted covalent inhibitors
- chemical probes
- drug discovery
- drug design
- covalent warheads
- covalent-reversible inhibitors
- reactivity assessment
- covalent fragments
- covalent degraders
Benefits of Publishing in a Special Issue
- Ease of navigation: Grouping papers by topic helps scholars navigate broad scope journals more efficiently.
- Greater discoverability: Special Issues support the reach and impact of scientific research. Articles in Special Issues are more discoverable and cited more frequently.
- Expansion of research network: Special Issues facilitate connections among authors, fostering scientific collaborations.
- External promotion: Articles in Special Issues are often promoted through the journal's social media, increasing their visibility.
- e-Book format: Special Issues with more than 10 articles can be published as dedicated e-books, ensuring wide and rapid dissemination.
Further information on MDPI's Special Issue polices can be found here.