Small Molecules to Fight Cancer and Neurodegenerative Diseases
A special issue of Pharmaceuticals (ISSN 1424-8247). This special issue belongs to the section "Medicinal Chemistry".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 25 November 2025 | Viewed by 26
Special Issue Editors
Interests: medicinal chemistry; rational drug design; heterocyclic compounds; structure–activity relationships; adenosine receptor ligands; carbonic anhydrase inhibitors; protein kinase CK1 and CK2 inhibitors; ecto-5′-nucleotidase (CD73) inhibitors
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: medicinal chemistry; rational drug design; heterocyclic compounds; structure–activity relationships; adenosine receptor ligands; carbonic anhydrase inhibitors; protein kinase CK1 and CK2 inhibitors; ecto-5′-nucleotidase (CD73) inhibitors
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: medicinal chemistry; rational drug design; heterocyclic compounds; structure–activity relationships; adenosine receptor ligands; carbonic anhydrase inhibitors; protein kinase CK1 and CK2 inhibitors; ecto-5′-nucleotidase (CD73) inhibitors
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Cancer and neurodegenerative diseases represent a great burden on society as they are the leading cause of mortality worldwide, and still no adequate therapies are available today. Thus, the search for promising and innovative new therapies is of paramount importance. Because of their tiny size, small molecules can more easily cross biological barriers and be successfully used to target specific proteins or macromolecules involved in such devastating diseases.
This Special Issues aims to showcase the latest studies on the identification of small-molecule drugs, as well as on the discovery of naturally occurring small molecules useful as anticancer or neuroprotective agents. Topics of interest for this Special Issue include the design of new potential therapeutics, supported by molecular modeling and synthetic chemistry methodologies, as well as biological and pharmacological studies.
Particular attention will be paid to emerging medicinal chemistry approaches with the aim of identifying new strategic chemical warriors such as targeted drugs, immunomodulators, multitarget agents, and PROTACs, endowed with greater efficacy and safety compared to traditional therapies to combat cancer and neurodegenerative diseases.
Authors are invited to submit original articles showcasing their research in these areas of investigation. Review articles summarizing the current knowledge on these topics are also of interest.
Dr. Daniela Catarzi
Dr. Vittoria Colotta
Dr. Flavia Varano
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Pharmaceuticals is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- small molecules
- cancer
- neurodegenerative diseases
- receptor ligands
- enzyme modulators
- targeted drugs
- multitarget agents
- PROTACs
- immunomodulators
- natural products
- drug design
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