Synthesis and evaluation of novel heteroaromatic substrates of GABA aminotransferase
作者:Dustin D. Hawker、Richard B. Silverman
DOI:10.1016/j.bmc.2012.08.009
日期:2012.10
Two principal neurotransmitters are involved in the regulation of mammalian neuronal activity, namely, gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA), an inhibitory neurotransmitter, and L-glutamic acid, an excitatory neurotransmitter. Low GABA levels in the brain have been implicated in epilepsy and several other neurological diseases. Because of GABA's poor ability to cross the blood-brain barrier (BBB), a successful strategy to raise brain GABA concentrations is the use of a compound that does cross the BBB and inhibits or inactivates GABA aminotransferase (GABA-AT), the enzyme responsible for GABA catabolism. Vigabatrin, a mechanism-based inactivator of GABA-AT, is currently a successful therapeutic for epilepsy, but has harmful side effects, leaving a need for improved GABA-AT inactivators. Here, we report the synthesis and evaluation of a series of heteroaromatic GABA analogues as substrates of GABA-AT, which will be used as the basis for the design of novel enzyme inactivators. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.