KMI-429

Recently, we reported substrate-based pentapeptidic β-secretase (BACE1) inhibitors with a hydroxymethylcarbonyl isostere as a substrate transition-state mimic. These inhibitors showed potent BACE1 inhibitory activity in enzyme and cell assays, with KMI-429 showing in vivo inhibition of Aβ production. We also designed and synthesized nonpeptidic and small-sized BACE1 inhibitors using "in-silico conformational structure-based design". By studying the structure-activity relationship of these inhibitors, we found that the σ-π interaction of an inhibitor with the BACE1-Arg235 side chain played a key role in the inhibition of BACE1. We speculated that a peptide capable of binding to the BACE1-Arg235 side chain via the σ-π interaction might exhibit BACE1 inhibitory activity. Hence, we designed and synthesized a series of peptides that were modified at the P2 position and found that some of these peptides exhibited a potent BACE1 inhibitory activity despite their structural similarity to the BACE1 substrate.

Previously reported pentapeptidic BACE1 inhibitors, designed using a substrate-based approach, were used as lead compounds for the further design of non-peptidic BACE1 inhibitors. Although these peptidic and non-peptidic inhibitors, with a hydroxymethylcarbonyl isostere as a substrate transition-state mimic, exhibited potent BACE1 inhibitory activities, their molecular-sizes appeared a little too big (molecular weight of >600daltons) for developing practical anti-Alzheimer's disease drugs. To develop lower weight BACE1 inhibitors, a series of tripeptidic BACE1 inhibitors were devised using a design approach based on the conformation of a virtual inhibitor bound to the BACE1 active site, also called 'in-silico conformational structure-based design'. Although these tripeptidic BACE1 inhibitors contained some natural amino acid residues, they are expected to be useful as lead compounds for developing the next generation BACE1 inhibitors, due to their low molecular size and unique structural features compared with previously reported inhibitors.