Drug design goals

Rational drug design is the ultimate goal of medicinal chemistry. By this is understood the design of medicinal agents on the basis of knowledge of the intimate biochemistry of the disease process. 

Computer advances now make these tools as available to the polymer chemist as they are to drug designers. While it is conceptually possible to design a polymer de novo using computer modeling techniques, this remains an optimistic goal. 

Figure 2.5. Diagramatic representation of the goal of rational drug design (a) illustrates the normal catalytic activity exhibited by purine nucleoside phosphorylase (PNP) (b) represents an effective inhibitor of PNP, which hts well into the active site thereby blocking its normal enzymatic activity...

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