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Publication Abstract from PubMed

In recent years, the selective inhibition of FKBP51 has emerged as a possible treatment for chronic pain, obesity-induced diabetes, or depression. All currently known advanced FKBP51-selective inhibitors, including the widely used SAFit2, contain a cyclohexyl residue as a key motif for enabling selectivity over the closest homologue and anti-target FKBP52. During a structure-based SAR exploration, we surprisingly discovered thiophenes as highly efficient cyclohexyl replacement moieties that retain the strong selectivity of SAFit-type inhibitors for FKBP51 over FKBP52. Cocrystal structures revealed that the thiophene-containing moieties enable selectivity by stabilizing a flipped-out conformation of Phe(67) of FKBP51. Our best compound, 19b, potently binds to FKBP51 biochemically as well as in mammalian cells, desensitize TRPV1 in primary sensory neurons, and has an acceptable PK profile in mice, suggesting its use as a novel tool compound for studying FKBP51 in animal models of neuropathic pain.

Structure-Based Discovery of a New Selectivity-Enabling Motif for the FK506-Binding Protein 51.,Knaup FH, Meyners C, Sugiarto WO, Wedel S, Springer M, Walz C, Geiger TM, Schmidt M, Sisignano M, Hausch F J Med Chem. 2023 Apr 14. doi: 10.1021/acs.jmedchem.3c00249. PMID:37058391^[1]

From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.