During this period, the project team began a medicinal chemistry campaign to identify SAR surrounding the lead chemotypes of hits previously identified through high-throughput screening, and optimization and characterization of these scaffolds is currently underway. The team is also trying to develop phenotypic cell-based screening assays to characterize protein-protein inhibitors of the Six1/ Eya interaction. As a center, the NCGC has fostered and maintained over 130 active collaborations with both NIH and extramural investigators, facilitating drug discovery efforts across the entire spectrum of human disease. These efforts have led to dozens of high-throughput screens and a number of medicinal chemistry campaigns to further improve on screening hits, providing our collaborators and the general research community with publications and a variety of promising small molecule probes and leads. In addition, the NCGC has worked to advance a number of informatic initiatives to make better use of existing drug and disease target information and provide the general public with easily accessible resources, further catalyzing the development of new therapies for human disease.
