Design, structure-based focusing and in silico screening of combinatorial library of peptidomimetic inhibitors of Dengue virus NS2B-NS3 protease.

Serine protease activity of the NS3 protein of Dengue virus is an important target of antiviral agents that interfere with the viral polyprotein precursor processing catalyzed by the NS3 protease (NS3pro), which is important for the viral replication and maturation. Recent studies showed that substrate-based peptidomimetics carrying an electrophilic warhead inhibit the NS2B-NS3pro cofactor-protease complex with inhibition constants in the low micromolar concentration range when basic amino acid residues occupy P(1) and P(2) positions of the inhibitor, and an aldehyde warhead is attached to the P(1). We have used computer-assisted combinatorial techniques to design, focus using the NS2B-NS3pro receptor 3D structure, and in silico screen a virtual library of more than 9,200 peptidomimetic analogs targeted around the template inhibitor Bz-Nle-Lys-Arg-Arg-H (Bz-benzoyl) that are composed mainly of unusual amino acid residues in all positions P(1)-P(4). The most promising virtual hits were analyzed in terms of computed enzyme-inhibitor interactions and Adsorption, Distribution, Metabolism and Excretion (ADME) related physico-chemical properties. Our study can direct the interest of medicinal chemists working on a next generation of antiviral chemotherapeutics against the Dengue Fever towards the explored subset of the chemical space that is predicted to contain peptide aldehydes with NS3pro inhibition potencies in nanomolar range which display ADME-related properties comparable to the training set inhibitors.