Drug Discovery, Design, and Development

These flashcards cover essential vocabulary related to drug discovery, design, and development processes.

Drug Discovery

The process by which novel drugs are identified, formulated and biologically tested before use in human patients.

Lead Compound

A bioactive compound resulting from a drug screening process that shows the desired pharmacological properties.

Preclinical Stage

Involves in vitro/in vivo testing procedures to assess drug candidates before human trials.

Target Validation

Demonstrating that 'hitting the target' can counteract a disease or bring patient relief.

Clinical Stage

The phase of drug development where drug candidates are tested in human subjects for efficacy and safety.

Phase I Trials

Initial clinical trials involving healthy human subjects to gather safety and dosing data.

Structure-Activity Relationship (SAR)

How the chemical structure of a compound affects its biological activity.

Structure-Property Relationship (SPR)

How drug-like physiochemical properties change with structural variations.

High-Throughput Screening (HTS)

An automated approach for rapid assessment of bioactivity for a large number of compounds.

Isosteres

Atoms/groups with the same valency that are electronically similar and can replace one another in compounds.

Bioisosteres

Structurally similar groups or atoms that impart similar biological properties to a chemical compound.

Rigidification

A drug modification strategy that limits conformational flexibility to improve selectivity and efficacy.

Lead Optimisation

The iterative process of refining a lead compound into a more drug-like entity.

Pharmacophore

The ensemble of steric and electronic effects necessary for effective ligand binding to a biological target.

Combination Chemistry

A synthetic method for the simultaneous synthesis of large libraries of chemically related compounds.

Antiviral Drugs

Medications used to treat viral infections by targeting viral replication mechanisms.

Adverse Drug Reactions (ADR)

Unwanted or harmful effects resulting from medication use that can occur during or after treatment.