ChemFlow─From 2D Chemical Libraries to Protein-Ligand Binding Free Energies

J Chem Inf Model. 2023 Jan 23;63(2):407-411. doi: 10.1021/acs.jcim.2c00919. Epub 2023 Jan 5.

Abstract

The accurate prediction of protein-ligand binding affinities is a fundamental problem for the rational design of new drug entities. Current computational approaches are either too expensive or inaccurate to be effectively used in virtual high-throughput screening campaigns. In addition, the most sophisticated methods, e.g., those based on configurational sampling by molecular dynamics, require significant pre- and postprocessing to provide a final ranking, which hinders straightforward applications by nonexpert users. We present a novel computational platform named ChemFlow to bridge the gap between 2D chemical libraries and estimated protein-ligand binding affinities. The software is designed to prepare a library of compounds provided in SMILES or SDF format, dock them into the protein binding site, and rescore the poses by simplified free energy calculations. Using a data set of 626 protein-ligand complexes and GPU computing, we demonstrate that ChemFlow provides relative binding free energies with an RMSE < 2 kcal/mol at a rate of 1000 ligands per day on a midsize computer cluster. The software is publicly available at https://github.com/IFMlab/ChemFlow.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Binding Sites
  • Entropy
  • Ligands
  • Molecular Dynamics Simulation*
  • Protein Binding
  • Small Molecule Libraries* / chemistry
  • Small Molecule Libraries* / pharmacology
  • Thermodynamics

Substances

  • Small Molecule Libraries
  • Ligands