Metformin directly targets the H3K27me3 demethylase KDM6A/UTX.

ABSTRACT: Metformin, the first drug chosen to be tested in a clinical trial aimed to target the biology of aging per se, has been clinically exploited for decades in the absence of a complete understanding of its therapeutic targets or chemical determinants. We here outline a systematic chemoinformatics approach to computationally predict biomolecular targets of metformin. Using several structure- and ligand-based software tools and reference databases containing 1,300,000 chemical compounds and more than 9,000 binding sites protein cavities, we identified 41 putative metformin targets including several epigenetic modifiers such as the member of the H3K27me3-specific demethylase subfamily, KDM6A/UTX. AlphaScreen and AlphaLISA assays confirmed the ability of metformin to inhibit the demethylation act

SUBMITTER: Cuyas E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6052472 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature