Translational Research
Research & Technology
Medicinal Chemistry
Research Interests

The Medicinal Chemistry team focuses on the optimization of compounds which are identified as effective against target diseases through primary screening. The optimization process is a multidisciplinary task to improve a compound's potential for development into a new drug through optimization of its biological activity, selectivity, physicochemical properties, in vivo properties, and safety. Within the context of cell-based assays, optimization to create drug candidates is accelerated by eliminating unsatisfactory compounds that are found to have low cell permeability and cytotoxicity during evaluation of biological activity. Additionally, integrating evaluation of in vivo properties and toxicity make our drug discovery process faster and more efficient. Thereby, qualified advanced molecules or preclinical candidates are created through lead optimization and our ample experience and creativity leads to successful research results.

The Medicinal Chemistry team’s area of expertise lies in diseases such as tuberculosis, cancer, hepatitis C, influenza, antibiotics, etc. We received funding for R&D from Korea Drug Development Fund (KDDF) for 18 months (2018-2019) for the "Discovery of novel anti-tubercular agent for the treatment of multidrug-resistant/extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis," and carried out studies to identify and evaluate efficacy and toxicity of anti-tubercular agents. Our endeavor in discovering novel drug candidates continues with strategic integration of synthetic chemistry and chembioinformatics.

Our areas of activity include:
• Advancing and accelerating the optimization on drug discovery program
• Developing novel chemical platform technology for innovative drug discovery (Establishment of PROTAC platform)
• Developing probe molecules for identifying target and understanding the in vivo mechanism of drug candidates
• Developing tool compounds for monitoring drug localization in either the cell or living animal
• Provide open analytical chemistry services, synthesis know-hows and molecular modeling analysis by giving access to IPK’s well-equipped infrastructure to support academia and pharmaceutical companies.

Members

Head

Inhee Choi, R.Ph., Ph.D.

  • Doctorate: College of Pharmacy, Ewha Womans University (2006)
  • Post-Doctorate: BMDRC, Korea (2006-2008), NIAID, National Institute of Health, USA (2008-2010)
  • Senior Researcher, Medicinal Chemistry, Bioinformatics, Institut Pasteur Korea (2010-2014, 2016-2020)
  • Head, Cheminformatics, Institut Pasteur Korea (2015)
  • Head, Medicinal Chemistry, Institut Pasteur Korea (2020-Present)
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  • Bora Lee

    Bora Lee, PhD

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  • Aram Lee

    Aram Lee, MS

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  • Eunji Jo

    Eunji Jo, MS

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  • Seorin Bang

    Seorin Bang, MS

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  • Youngmi Kim

    Youngmi Kim, MS

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  • Jihyeon Yun

    Jihyeon Yun

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Selected Publications