mefloquine   Click here for help

GtoPdb Ligand ID: 4252

Synonyms: GNF-Pf-5544 | Lariam® | Ro-21-5998-001 | WR-142490
Approved drug PDB Ligand Antimalarial Ligand
mefloquine is an approved drug (FDA (1989), UK (1989))
Compound class: Synthetic organic
Comment: Mefloquine belongs to the aryl amino alcohols, a chemical class of antimalarial drugs that includes quinine, lumefantrine and halofantrine.
The approved drug is a racemic mixture of (R,S)- and (S,R)-enantiomers. We show the chemical structure without stereochemistry to represent the mixture and the non-isomeric structure is also represented in the PubChem and ChEMBL entries listed in the links table below, while the two enantiomers forming the racemate are represented by PubChem CID 40692 and PubChem CID 456309. PubChem lists 9 stereoisotopes.
The administerd form contains the mefloquine hydrochloride salt.

The Malaria tab on this ligand page provides additional curator comments of relevance to the Guide to MALARIA PHARMACOLOGY.

Activity at non-malarial protein targets:
Racemic mefloquine has been identified as an antagonist of the human adenosine A2A and A1 receptors, with nanomolar binding affinities [8]. The (11R,2'S) isomer of mefloquine (PubChem CID 456309) has been determined as the most potent A2A binder, with a Ki of 61 nM (Ki vs. A1 receptor is 255 nM) [4]. It has been suggested that off-target activity at human adenosine receptors may contribute towards the adverse neuropsychiatric side-effects that are associated with mefloquine use.
Click here for help

Ligand Activity Visualisation Charts

These are box plot that provide a unique visualisation, summarising all the activity data for a ligand taken from ChEMBL and GtoPdb across multiple targets and species. Click on a plot to see the median, interquartile range, low and high data points. A value of zero indicates that no data are available. A separate chart is created for each target, and where possible the algorithm tries to merge ChEMBL and GtoPdb targets by matching them on name and UniProt accession, for each available species. However, please note that inconsistency in naming of targets may lead to data for the same target being reported across multiple charts.

✖

View interactive charts of activity data across species
2D Structure
Click here for help

2D Structure

An image of the ligand's 2D structure. For small molecules with SMILES these are drawn using the NCI/CADD Chemical Identifier Resolver. Click on the image to access the chemical structure search tool with the ligand pre-loaded in the structure editor. For other types of ligands, e.g. longer nucleotides and peptides, a manually drawn representation of the molecule may be provided.

✖
Click here for structure editor
Physico-chemical Properties
Click here for help

Physico-chemical Properties

Calculated molecular properties are available for small molecules and natural products (not peptides). Properties were generated using the CDK toolkit. All properties were selected to enable the prediction of the Lipinski Rule-of-Five profile or ‘druglikeness’ for each ligand. For more info on each category see the help pages.

✖
Hydrogen bond acceptors 3
Hydrogen bond donors 2
Rotatable bonds 4
Topological polar surface area 45.15
Molecular weight 378.12
XLogP 3.87
No. Lipinski's rules broken 0
SMILES / InChI / InChIKey
Click here for help

SMILES / InChI / InChIKey

SMILES (Simplified Molecular Input Line Entry Specification) A specification for unambiguously describing the structure of chemical molecules using short ASCII strings. Canonical SMILES specify a unique representation of the 2D structure without chiral or isotopic specifications. Isomeric SMILES include chiral specification and isotopes.

Standard InChI (IUPAC International Chemical Identifier) and InChIKey InChI is a non-proprietary, standard, textual identifier for chemical substances designed to facilitate linking of information and database searching. An InChIKey is a simplified version of a full InChI, designed for easier web searching.

✖
Canonical SMILES OC(c1cc(nc2c1cccc2C(F)(F)F)C(F)(F)F)C1CCCCN1
Isomeric SMILES OC(c1cc(nc2c1cccc2C(F)(F)F)C(F)(F)F)C1CCCCN1
InChI InChI=1S/C17H16F6N2O/c18-16(19,20)11-5-3-4-9-10(15(26)12-6-1-2-7-24-12)8-13(17(21,22)23)25-14(9)11/h3-5,8,12,15,24,26H,1-2,6-7H2
InChI Key XEEQGYMUWCZPDN-UHFFFAOYSA-N
Guide to Malaria Pharmacology Comments
Mefloquine was first introduced for the treatment of chloroquine resistant malaria but resistance to mefloquine itself soon emerged [1,7].
Mefloquine is listed in the World Health Organization's 22nd Essential Medicines List (2021) as a curative treatment for uncomplicated P. falciparum malaria in combination with artesunate. This is one of the artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs) recommended in the WHO Guidelines for malaria [10].

Potential Target/Mechanism Of Action: As the precise mechanism of action of mefloquine is not yet known, we do not have a molecular target for this compound. Further information about possible mechanistic insights is provided under the Clinical data tab.