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Updated: Jun 11, 2026

Incorporating Target Protein Structure Flexibility and Dynamics in Computational Drug Discovery Using Ensemble-Based Docking Analysis
Published on: June 20, 2025
Analysis of binding modes of ligands to multiple conformations of CYP3A4
Vitor H Teixeira1, Vera Ribeiro, Paulo J Martel
1Centro de Biomedicina Molecular e Estrutural/Institute of Biotechnology and Bioengineering, Universidade do Algarve, Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia, Campus de Gambelas, 8005-139 Faro, Portugal.
Abstract:
Cytochromes P450 (CYPs) are extremely versatile enzymes capable of catalyzing a vast number of compounds, and CYP3A4 is no exception metabolizing approximately half of the currently marketed drugs, besides endogenous compounds. To metabolize such a variety of compounds, CYP3A4 has to be extremely flexible, which makes interaction studies difficult. We employ a multi-conformational docking setup where conformations are generated by several molecular dynamics simulations to analyze the binding modes of various ligands, and the docking is considered successful if the ligand site of catalysis (SOC) is within 6.0A of the haem Fe. While docking with the X-ray structure proved unsuccessful with all ligands, the multi-conformational docking achieved successful binding of each ligand to at least one protein conformation. Analysis of the docked solutions highlights residues in the active site cavity that may have an important role in access, binding and stabilization of the ligand.
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