Size and Chameleonic Behavior

As a result of hydrophobic and/or hydrophilic folding, a solute may become more polar in polar solvents and more lipophilic in nonpolar solvents. In effect, such a solute to some extent adapts its lipophilicity to that of the medium, thereby behaving analogously to a chameleon, which changes color to resemble that of the environment.  

In drug design, the first aim of any modeling method is to predict activities for compounds prior to their synthesis. Based on the success of QSAR studies using lipophilicity parameters, interest in calculating lipophilicity parameters directly from chemical structure has grown rapidly. 

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