Three-dimensional pharmacophore modeling of liver-X receptor agonists

J Chem Inf Model. 2011 Sep 26;51(9):2147-55. doi: 10.1021/ci100511v. Epub 2011 Mar 24.

Abstract

High cholesterol levels contribute to hyperlipidemia. Liver X receptors (LXRs) are the drug targets. LXRs regulate the cholesterol absorption, biosynthesis, transportation, and metabolism. Novel agonists of LXR, especially LXRβ, are attractive solutions for treating hyperlipidemia. In order to discover novel LXRβ agonists, a three-dimensional pharmacophore model was built based upon known LXRβ agonists. The model was validated with a test set, a virtual screening experiment, and the FlexX docking approach. Results show that the model is capable of predicting a LXRβ agonist activity. Ligand-based virtual screening results can be refined by cross-linking by structure-based approaches. This is because two ligands that are mapped in the same way to the same pharmacophore model may have significantly different binding behaviors in the receptor's binding pocket. This paper reports our approach to identify reliable pharmacophore models through combining both ligand- and structure-based approaches.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
  • Validation Study

MeSH terms

  • Humans
  • Hyperlipidemias / drug therapy
  • Ligands
  • Liver X Receptors
  • Models, Molecular*
  • Orphan Nuclear Receptors / agonists*

Substances

  • Ligands
  • Liver X Receptors
  • Orphan Nuclear Receptors