Design, synthesis and assaying of potential aquaporin inhibitors

Abstract

The aquaporin protein family performs fundamental tasks in the physiology of several organs in the human body. Their roles in several disorders known to involve water movement make them attractive targets for the development of novel drug therapies. This chapter describes assays commonly used to study the water permeability across AQPs. It also describes the effect of some known inhibitors of aquaporins on water permeability, such as mercury, gold, silver, copper, phloretin, tetraethyl ammonium salts and acetazolamide compounds. © 2009 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.