Covalent inhibitors: an opportunity for rational target selectivity

There is a resurging interest in compounds that engage their target through covalent interactions. Cysteine's thiol is endowed with enhanced reactivity, making it the nucleophile of choice for covalent engagement with a ligand aligning an electrophilic trap with a cysteine residue in a target of interest. The paucity of cysteine in the proteome coupled to the fact that closely related proteins do not necessarily share a given cysteine residue enable a level of unprecedented rational target selectivity. The recent demonstration that a lysine's amine can also be engaged covalently with a mild electrophile extends the potential of covalent inhibitors. The growing database of protein structures facilitates the discovery of covalent inhibitors while the advent of proteomic technologies enables a finer resolution in the selectivity of covalently engaged proteins. Here, we discuss recent examples of discovery and design of covalent inhibitors.