To test this hypothesis, Dr. Rubin said the next step will be to initiate a high throughput
small molecule library screen in SMN - deficient motor neurons.
Once the
Vanderbilt small molecule library has been screened for potential modulators of the Y4 receptor, I will use the results to design efficient and accurate descriptors that can be used with artificial neural networks to predict activity at the Y4 receptor based on a small molecule's structural properties.
The facility maintains
a small molecule library of ~ 100,000 drug - like small molecules for high - throughput screening and provides access to liquid handling robotics and a multilabel plate reader.
The identification of disease signatures will enable screens of
small molecule libraries to delineate molecular targets that modulate these disease signatures and identify new diagnostic and therapeutic leads for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
The investigations are frequently combined with large scale perturbation methods, including gene - based (RNAi, miss - expression of wild type and mutant genes) and chemical approaches using
small molecule libraries.