Study on the active mechanism of β-secretase inhibitors by molecular simulations.

The proteolytic enzyme β-secretase (BACE-1) is one of potential drug targets for treating Alzheimers's disease. First, the reliable and accurate models of three-dimensional quantitative structure-activity relationship for the BACE-1 inhibitors were established, and the several important structural factors that mainly influence the inhibitory activity were obtained. Second, the results of molecular docking presented the binding mode between BACE-1 and its inhibitors, and molecular dynamic simulations provided the details of the receptor-ligand interactions. Furthermore, several new derivatives were designed and validated based on these theoretical analyses. Our studies revealed the binding mechanism between BACE-1 and its inhibitors, and provide some insights into the further structural modification and the design of new inhibitors with higher activity.