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STRUCTURAL BIOINFORMATICS IN DRUG DISCOVERY
The pharmaceutical industry had its origins in the beginning of the twentieth century. Scientific advancement has since seen the discovery of DNA and sequencing of the human genome, the understanding of proteins as specific molecular entities, the harnessing of X-rays to understand proteins at the atomic level, and the introduction of computational technology. All these advancements have allowed structural bioinformatics to begin to do its part to further aid drug discovery. This chapter will take a brief look at the development of the drug discovery process before discussing the current and future role of structural bioinformatics in this context.
HISTORIC DEVELOPMENT OF DRUG DISCOVERY
The current dominant paradigm the pharmaceutical drug discovery follows is to search for a particular small-molecule modulator of a specific macromolecular target. A protein with a known or a suspected role in a disease process is selected and small-molecule modulators of the protein are identified and optimized. Our ability to pursue this paradigm rests on the scientific and technological achievements of the twentieth century, particularly with regard to our ability to manipulate organic small molecules on the one hand and to study the biological targets on the other (Drews, 2000). Humanity has, of course, been looking for remedies for its ailments long before there was a drug discovery ...
