, 2012). HEK293 lines expressing GluK2 kainate receptors, together with aequorin, a bioluminescent Ca2+ reporter protein, were used to determine the effect of the compounds Tozasertib being investigated on GluK2 receptor activity. The influx of Ca2+ ions through open kainate receptor ion channels led to oxidation of coelenterazine, the cofactor of aequorin, which eventually resulted in the emission of photons. After incubation of the cells with coelenterazine, the culture medium was replaced with an assay buffer (Ringer

buffer + 100 mM CaCl2). In a luminometer (LumiStar, BMG, Germany), 275 μM of glutamate was applied to the cells and the luminescence signals were recorded before, during, and after glutamate application. Molecular modeling The homology model of the GluK2 receptor was constructed as described previously (Kaczor et al., 2014). The crystal structure of the AMPA GluA2 receptor (PDB ID: 3KG2) (Sobolevsky et al., 2009) was selected as the main template. Additional templates were used for the N-terminal domain (crystal structure of the GluK2/GluK5 NTD tetramer assembly, PDB ID: 3QLV) (Kumar

et al., 2011) and the ligand-binding domain (crystal structure of GluK1 ligand-binding domain (S1S2) in complex with an antagonist, PDB ID: 4DLD) (Venskutonytė et al., 2012). Homology modeling was carried out with Modeler v. 9.11 (Eswar et al., 2006). Input conformations of the compounds being investigated were prepared using the LigPrep protocol from the Schrödinger this website Suite. To sample different protonation states of the ligands in physiological pH, the Epik module was used. The structural and electronic parameters of the ligands were calculated with VegaZZ v.2.4.0.25 (Pedretti et al., 2004), Gausian09 (Frisch et al., 2009), and Farnesyltransferase Discovery Studio 3.1. Molecular docking was performed with Glide from the Schrödinger Suite. Molecular dynamics of ligand-receptor complexes were performed as described previously (Kaczor et al., 2014). Ligand-receptor complexes were inserted into a POPC lipid bilayer and water

with a suitable module of Schrödinger suite of programs, and sodium and click here potassium ions were added to balance the protein charges and then up to a concentration of 0.15 M. The stability of the ligand-receptor complexes was assessed by molecular dynamics simulations with Desmond v. 3.0.3.1 (Bowers et al., 2006) The ligand-receptor complexes in lipid bilayer were minimized and subjected to MD first in the NVT ensemble for 1 ns and then in the NPT ensemble for 20 ns. The following software was also used to visualize the results: Chimera v.1.5.3 (Pettersen et al., 2004), VegaZZ v.2.4.0.25, Yasara Structure v.11.9.18 (Krieger and Vriend, 2002), and PyMol v.0.99 (The PyMOL Molecular Graphics System, Version 0.99, Schrödinger, LLC). Results and discussion Chemistry The synthesis of compounds 2–7 is presented in Fig. 2. Compound 2 was obtained by Fischer indolization reaction.