Cited by 611Computational Drug Discovery MethodsProtein Structure and DynamicsCholinesterase and Neurodegenerative Diseases

Beware of Docking!

Chen, Yu-Chian·2015·Trends in Pharmacological Sciences

Abstract

Docking is now routine in virtual screening or lead optimization for drug screening and design. The number of papers related to docking has dramatically increased over the past decade. However, there are many issues to consider when undertaking a docking study. Frequent problems or issues arise, such as the wrong binding site of the target protein, screening using an unsuitable small-molecule database, the choice of docking pose, high dock score but failed in molecular dynamics (MD) simulation, and lack of clarity over whether the compound is an inhibitor or agonist. These problems should be cause for caution and concern before performing docking. Some papers show comprehensive biochemistry experiments but only a simple docking figure. This review presents some evidence to show that the docking might be questionable, despite a high score. In some cases, the accuracy of docking can even change from 0% to 92.66%. Thus, please beware of docking!

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Crossref · 10.1016/j.tips.2014.12.001

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Authors
Chen, Y.-C.
Venue
Trends in Pharmacological Sciences
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2015-02
Volume
36
Issue
2
Pages
78-95
ISSN
0165-6147 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2014952106
Cited by
611
References
183
Citations by year
2026: 46 · 2025: 41 · 2024: 56 · 2023: 59 · 2022: 79 · 2021: 55 · 2020: 66 · 2019: 57 · 2018: 54 · 2017: 50 · 2016: 32 · 2015: 16
FWCI
2.69
Type
journal article
Language
en
Update notices
erratum (2015-09-01)
Open access
closed
Locations
  • Trends in Pharmacological Sciences (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Funders
  • Clinical Trial Center, China Medical University Hospital (DOH102-TD-B-111-004)
  • Ministry of Education
  • National Science Council (NSC102-2221-E-468-027, NSC102-2325-B039-001)
  • China Medical University Hospital (DMR-103-096)
  • China Medical University, Taiwan
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computational Theory and Mathematics › Computational Drug Discovery Methods
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Protein Structure and Dynamics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Pharmacology › Cholinesterase and Neurodegenerative Diseases
Keywords
molecular docking, binding site identification, virtual screening, lead optimization, drug design
MeSH terms
Algorithms, Humans, Ligands, Molecular Conformation, Drug Design, Molecular Dynamics Simulation, Molecular Docking Simulation

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