Transferability of cocrystallization propensities between aromatic and heteroaromatic amides

Abstract

New virtual cocrystal screening was proposed taking advantage of the similarities between cocrystallization landscapes of different compounds. Assuming that cocrystallization propensities can be modeled by miscibility affinities of liquid components under supercooled conditions, the quantitative rules of likeness were formulated and validated for 45 aromatic and heteroaromatic amides interacting with a variety of coformers. The most important finding comes from the observed linear trends between the values of mixing enthalpies of amides with respect to a reference molecule. Particularly isonicotinamide was found as a very convenient comparative system since it constitutes 97 binary cocrystals. Many experimentally observed cocrystals were used for supporting the analogy hypothesis, which states that a properly selected reference molecule, for which cocrystals were experimentally documented, can provide practical information about cocrystallization propensities of another compound provided that two criterions are met, namely sufficiently high similarities and high enough affinities. Hence, it is not necessary to perform experimental cocrystallization of every pair of coformers since miscibility in the solid state of one compound can be transferred to another one at least in the case of aromatic or hetero-aromatic amides.