Chiral Drugs (PDF)

An integrated view of chiral drugs--from concept and
synthesisto pharmaceutical properties

Chirality greatly influences a drug's biological and
pharmacological properties. In an effort to achieve more
predictable results from chiral drugs, the Food and Drug
Administration now requires that these medicines be as pure as
possible, which places great demands on drug synthesis,
purification, analysis, and testing. To assist researchers in
acquiring the essential knowledge to meet these rigid guidelines,
Chiral Drugs focuses on three vital chiral
technologies--asymmetric synthesis, biocatalytic process, and
chiral resolution--to offer details on the basic concepts, key
developments, and recent trends in chiral drug discovery, along
with:

* The history of chiral drugs development and industrial
applications of chiral technologies

* A section listing twenty-five approved or advanced-trial chiral
drugs that lists each drug name, chemical name and properties, a
representative synthetic pathway, pharmacological
characterizations, and references

* An interdisciplinary approach combining synthetic organic
chemistry, medicinal chemistry, and pharmacology

Nearly two-thirds of the drugs on today's market are chiral
drugs. Reducing and eliminating their negative characteristics is
an ongoing and serious challenge for the pharmaceutical industry.
With its well-balanced approach to covering each important aspect
of chirality, Chiral Drugs champions important strategies for
tipping the medical scale in a positive direction for the
production of more effective--and safer--drugs.