Structure-activity methods molecular modification

The conceptual basis for similarity analysis is provided by the similarity-property principle that states that similar molecules have similar biological activity.This rather intuitive principle has been widely accepted and substantiated by a wealth of observations. The success of many similarity-based virtual screening calculations can only be rationalized on the basis of this principle. However, minor modifications in molecular structure can dramatically alter the biological activity of a small molecule. This situation is exploited in lead optimization elforts, but limits the potential of similarity methods. These considerations also suggest that there must be fundamental dilferences between the structure-activity relationships (SARs). Thus, difierent types of SARs are expected to critically determine the success of similarity methods and systematic SAR analysis helps to better understand on a case-by-case basis why similarity methods might succeed or fail. 

Understanding the relationship between molecular structure and materials piroperties or biological activity is one of the most important facets of biomaterials synthesis and new-drug design. This is especially true for polyphosphazenes, where the molecular structure and properties can be varied so widely by small modifications to the substitutive method of synthesis. 

Since the value of H depends on the choice of , modifications of this procedure have been proposed (Fernandez Piema and Massart 2000). Another modification of the Hopkins statistic—published in the chemometrics literature—concern the distributions of the values of the used variables (Hodes 1992 Jurs and Lawson 1991 Lawson and Jurs 1990). The Hopkins statistic has been suggested for an evaluation of variable selection methods with the aim to find a variable set (for instance, molecular descriptors) that gives distinct clustering of the objects (for instance, chemical structures)—hoping that the clusters reflect, for instance, different biological activities (Lawson and Jurs 1990). 

The Free-Wilson Method. This method also assumes that biological activity can be described by the additive properties of the substituents on a basic molecular structure. In the Fujita-Ban modification of this method... 

---