Researchers develop a new class of covalent inhibitor for a protein involved in brain diseases Blog Post

An article published in Cell Chemical Biology by scientists at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona) in Barcelona Science Park (PCB) describes a new class of prolyl oligopeptidase (POP) inhibitors. Found mostly in the brain, POP protein has emerged as an “attractive·” therapeutic target for the treatment of several cognitive and neurodegenerative disorders, such as Parkinson’s disease and schizophrenia.The work was done in collaboration with the biotech Iproteos, based in PCB and scientists at the University of Glasgow (Scotland, UK) and the Utrecht Institute for Pharmaceutical Sciences (the Netherlands). The study has also involved the Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Laboratory (LRB) –wich is part of CCiTUB and it’s located in the Cluster building of the Park– and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC).