19F-NMR in Target-based Drug Discovery

Solution NMR spectroscopy plays important roles in understanding protein structures, dynamics and protein-protein/ligand interactions. In a target-based drug discovery project, NMR can serve an important function in hit identification and lead optimization. Fluorine is a valuable probe for evaluating protein conformational changes and protein-ligand interactions. Accumulated studies demonstrate that F-19-NMR can play important roles in fragment-based drug discovery (FBDD) and probing protein-ligand interactions. This review summarizes the application of F-19-NMR in understanding protein-ligand interactions and drug discovery. Several examples are included to show the roles of F-19-NMR in confirming identified hits/leads in the drug discovery process. In addition to identifying hits from fluorine-containing compound libraries, F-19-NMR will play an important role in drug discovery by providing a fast and robust way in novel hit identification. This technique can be used for ranking compounds with different binding affinities and is particularly useful for screening competitive compounds when a reference ligand is available.