Benjamin Gann, Utah Valley University
Life Sciences
(E)-2,4-bis(p-hydroxyphenyl)-2-butenal (2-Butenal) was shown to inhibit various inflammatory responses by inhibiting NF-kB pathway. A pull-down assay proved 2-butenal to bind to IKKb and was proposed as an active site kinase inhibitor through molecular docking experiment. However, 2-butanal has a highly conjugated aldehyde group that makes it very unstable. Therefore, we have designed more stable 2-butenal analogues and prepared them using Heck reaction. Molecular docking experiment shows that many of them have a greater affinity to IKKb.