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Protac-Induced Protein Degradation in Drug Discovery: Breaking the Rules or Just Making New Ones?
Abstract
Targeted protein degradation, using bifunctional small molecules (Protacs) to remove specific proteins from within cells, has emerged as a novel drug discovery strategy with the potential to offer therapeutic interventions not achievable with existing approaches. In this Perspective, the brief history of the field is surveyed from a drug discovery perspective with a focus on the key advances in knowledge which have led to the definition and exemplification of protein degradation concepts and their resulting applications to medicine discovery. The approach has the potential to bring disruptive change to drug discovery; the many potential advantages and outstanding challenges which lie ahead of this technology are discussed.
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“and can have a duration of action that extends beyond clearance and depends on the turnover rate of the protein target rather than residence time 23,24,25 .”
From Targeted protein degradation: expanding the toolbox (2019) · cites this paper as [24]
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Targeted protein degradation: expanding the toolbox
Schapira, M., Calabrese, M. F., Bullock, A. N., & Crews, C. M. (2019) · Nature Reviews Drug Discovery · doi:10.1038/s41573-019-0047-y · Cited by 960
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“As already suggested, chemically converting failed small molecule-based drugs into PROTACs could give fast access to new therapeutics [8].”
BackgroundInfluentialA selective BCL-XL PROTAC degrader achieves safe and potent antitumor activity
Khan, S., Zhang, X., Lv, D., Zhang, Q., He, Y., Zhang, P., Liu, X., Thummuri, D., Yuan, Y., Wiegand, J. S., et al. (2019) · Nature Medicine · doi:10.1038/s41591-019-0668-z · Cited by 688
PROTACs: great opportunities for academia and industry
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Nalawansha, D. A., & Crews, C. M. (2020) · Cell chemical biology · doi:10.1016/j.chembiol.2020.07.020 · Cited by 523
Metadata
- Authors
- Churcher, I.
- Affiliations
- BenevolentBio, 40 Churchway, London NW1 1LW, U.K.
- Corresponding author
- Churcher, Ian
- ORCID
- Churcher, Ian
- Venue
- Journal of Medicinal Chemistry
- Publisher
- American Chemical Society (ACS)
- Published
- 2017-12-19
- Volume
- 61
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 444-452
- ISSN
- 0022-2623 (ISSN-L)
- 1520-4804
- OpenAlex
- W2769590617
- Cited by
- 491
- References
- 67
- Citations by year
- 2026: 45 · 2025: 61 · 2024: 49 · 2023: 56 · 2022: 53 · 2021: 54 · 2020: 84 · 2019: 64 · 2018: 22 · 2017: 1
- FWCI
- 4.43
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Medicinal Chemistry (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Protein Degradation and Inhibitors
- Physical Sciences › Chemistry › Organic Chemistry › Chemical Synthesis and Analysis
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Ubiquitin and proteasome pathways
- Keywords
- targeted protein degradation, PROTACs, bifunctional small molecules, protein degradation, drug discovery
- MeSH terms
- Humans, Peptides, Recombinant Proteins, Drug Design, Ubiquitin-Protein Ligases, Small Molecule Libraries, Ubiquitination, Drug Discovery, Molecular Targeted Therapy, Proteolysis
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