DRUG‐RECEPTOR RECOGNITION: ELECTROSTATIC FIELD LINES AT THE RECEPTOR AND DIELECTRIC EFFECTS

Abstract

1 In this paper the directional component of the vector electrostatic field emanating from a drug receptor is analysed in the three orthogonal planes 2 B-DNA with an alternating guanine-cytosine sequence was chosen for a receptor model and the lines of force constructed for two dielectric conditions, namely the cases where firstly the dielectric is homogeneous and a constant throughout the space surrounding the receptor, and secondly where the dielectric is inhomogeneous and is treated as a vector quantity 3 Electric field line maps indicate marked differences in the local fields situated in the helical wide and narrow grooves for the different sequences of cytosine and guanine; these variations are enhanced when the dielectric is handled as a vector 4 The significance of electric field lines in interpreting receptor-induced ligand orientation effects is discussed since the direction of the lines is related to the torque that a receptor would impose on an attacking drug molecule.