A key technical challenge in creating new sulphur-based medicines has been overcome, leading to the prospect of many new therapeutic 'weapons' in the fight against disease and illness. Every successful drug has a part of it that physically fits into the exact biochemical pathway it is trying to disrupt. This part of the drug is known as a 'pharmacophore' and generating new ones is a key goal in drug discovery. Sulphur-based pharmacophores are highly versatile and seen as very promising to drug developers but are rare due to the challenges of synthesising them. Now, scientists have designed a method to generate sulphur pharmacophores using a catalyst specially developed by the scientists themselves, known as pentanidium. Their method could be used to synthesise a broad range of new pharmacophores that could be paired with different types of molecules to form new drugs.

Institute of Chemical and Engineering Sciences