Discovery of a true bivalent dopamine D2 receptor agonist

Employing two different alkyne-modified dopamine agonists to construct bivalent compounds via click chemistry resulted in the identification of a bivalent ligand (11c) for dopamine D-2 receptor homodimer, which, compared to its parent monomeric alkyne, showed a 16-fold higher binding affinity for the dopamine D-2 receptor and a 5-fold higher potency in a cAMP assay in HEK 293T cells stably expressing D2R. Molecular modeling revealed that 11c can indeed bridge the orthosteric binding sites of a D2R homodimer in a relaxed conformation via the TM5-TM6 interface and allows to largely rationalize the results of the receptor assays. (C) 2020 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

Publication year:2021

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