Allosterix Pharmaceuticals had developed a patent-pending technology for locating allosteric sites and peptidic drug design. The companys approach to drug design involved creating inhibitors based on the principles of allostery. The advantage of this approach is greater specificity, as selectivity is inherent in each peptidic inhibitor. Allosteric sites are located distal to the active site, in nonconserved regions of the enzyme. By designing drugs for these regions, researchers can produce inhibitors with unprecedented selectivity profiles. This is a departure from previous drug design strategies aimed at inhibiting enzymatic functions. These allosteric inhibitors show little to no reactivity with other enzymes, even very closely related enzymes. This translates into a low incidence of unwanted side effects or toxicity, giving an allosteric inhibitor a significantly higher chance of success at the clinical stage. Allosterix Pharmaceuticals LLC had been part of Silicon Slopes, a nonprofit organization and start-up greenhouse located in Lehi, Utah, USA.
