A Comprehensive Platform to study drug interaction with physiologically important

CNS Transporters have crucial roles on neurophysiology and etiology. Inhibition of these critical transporters can have therapeutic benefits or cause serious side effects in the CNS. Development of an assay platform and a comprehensive profile of drugs' inhibitory effects on important CNS transporters can have enormous impact on drug discovery and development, such as elucidating drugs' potential side effects in the CNS, and advancing development of new drugs to treat various CNS diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's diseases, epilepsy etc., The overall goal of the proposed studies is to further the knowledge and available tools to study drug interactions with membrane transporters localized through-out the CNS. Built upon successful Phase I studies, the Phase II studies will result in the most comprehensive collection of CNS transporter assays (25+) commercially available to academic and industrial researchers, removing a critical assay bottleneck in transporter research and CNS drug development. The screening studies (350 CNS and peripherally acting against 20+ key CNS transporters) represent the largest effect to date on in vitro inhibition screen, characterization and in vitro-in vivo extrapolation (IVIVE) of prescription drugs against a panelof key CNS transporters. This innovative approach will provide critical information fundamental to CNS transporter pharmacology, moreover, it could potential lead to discovery of new therapeutic indications for approved drugs. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Success of this project would benefit public health enormously through helping inform and mitigate drugs' potential side effects in the CNS, and by helping develop pharmaceuticals to treat various serious CNS disorders, such as Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, epilepsy, etc. Specifically, the proposed studies will be invaluable for evaluating off-target effects of both CNS and peripherally acting drugs on critical CNS transporters of physiological and/or pharmacological significance, which could potentially lead to discovering new therapeutic indications for marketed CNS drugs, and identifying/validating novel molecular targets for therapeutic intervention.