High-throughput screening technologies can test millions of small molecules to find compounds that serve as starting points for drug discovery. However, before human clinical trials can start, medicinal chemists must optimize these compounds, requiring a significant investment in time, labor, and money.  As a result, drug discovery tends to focus on well-established proteins instead of exploring novel drug targets. 

Seiya Kitamura, Ph.D., has received a five-year, $2.1 million grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences to find novel drug targets by using an innovative drug discovery technology. Dr. Kitamura’s laboratory has developed a first-of-its-kind sulfur-fluoride exchange (SuFEx)-enabled high-throughput medicinal chemistry technology for rapidly optimizing chemical probes and drug candidates. The Kitamura lab has successfully used the technology on model proteins and will now focus on biological targets that have not previously been explored but are critical to human diseases. His team will also develop chemical probes with subcellular resolution to determine the functional differences of proteins in individual organelles and other subcellular components. The research will accelerate small molecule drug development and deepen understanding of biological systems. 

Dr. Kitamura is an assistant professor of biochemistry at Einstein. (1R35GM155249-01)