Molecular modeling of wild-type and antifolate resistant mutant Plasmodium falciparum DHFR.
The development of drug resistance is reducing the efficiency of antifolates as antimalarials. This phenomenon has been linked to the occurrence of mutations in the parasite's dihydrofolate reductase (DHFR). In this way, the resistance to pyrimethamine and cycloguanil, two potent inhibitors of P. falciparum DHFR, is mainly related to mutations (single and crossed) at residues 16, 51, 59, 108 and 164 of the enzyme. In this work, we have refined a recently proposed homology-model of P. falciparum DHFR, and the resulting structure was used to obtain models for 14 mutant enzymes, employing molecular modeling. Ternary complexes of the mutant enzymes with these inhibitors have been superimposed to equivalent ternary complexes of the wild-type enzyme, allowing the proposition of hypotheses for the role of each mutation in drug resistance. Based on these results, possible reasons for antifolate resistance have been proposed.
Departamento de Engenharia Química, Instituto Militar de Engenharia, Praça General Tibúrcio, 80, Praia Vermelha, 22290-270, -RJ, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Reinaldo Teixeira
RT
Delfino
Osvaldo Andrade
OA
Santos-Filho
José Daniel
JD
Figueroa-Villar
D000818:Animals; D002645:Chickens; D004351:Drug Resistance; D005493:Folic Acid Antagonists / Q000737:chemistry / Q000494:pharmacology; D006801:Humans; D008099:Liver / Q000201:enzymology; D016778:Malaria, Falciparum / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000469:parasitology; D008956:Models, Chemical; D008957:Models, Genetic; D008958:Models, Molecular; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010963:Plasmodium falciparum / Q000187:drug effects / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics*; D017354:Point Mutation; D002727:Proguanil; D011739:Pyrimethamine / Q000737:chemistry / Q000494:pharmacology; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D013762:Tetrahydrofolate Dehydrogenase / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics*; D014227:Triazines / Q000737:chemistry / Q000494:pharmacology
D005493:Folic Acid Antagonists; D014227:Triazines; C026009:cycloguanil; C006201:BRL 6231; D013762:Tetrahydrofolate Dehydrogenase; D002727:Proguanil; D011739:Pyrimethamine