How polypharmacologic is each chemogenomics library?

Aim: High-throughput phenotypic screens have emerged as a promising avenue for small-molecule drug discovery. The challenge faced in high-throughput phenotypic screens is target deconvolution once a small molecule hit is identified. Chemogenomics libraries have emerged as an important tool for meeting this challenge. Here, we investigate their target-specificity by deriving a 'polypharmacology index' for broad chemogenomics screening libraries.

Methods: All known targets of all the compounds in each library were plotted as a histogram and fitted to a Boltzmann distribution, whose linearized slope is indicative of the overall polypharmacology of the library.

Results & conclusion: Comparison of libraries clearly distinguished the most target-specific library, which might be assumed to be more useful for target deconvolution in a phenotypic screen.