Theoretical and Experimental Investigation of Acidity of the Glutamate Receptor Antagonist 6,7-Dinitro-1,4-dihydroquinoxaline-2,3-dione and Its Possible Implication in GluA2 Binding

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The acidity of organic compounds is highly relevant to understanding several biological processes. Although the relevance and challenges in estimating p K a values of organic acids is recognized by several reported works in the literature, there is a lack in determining the acidity of amides. This paper presents an experimental/theoretical combined investigation on the acid dissociation of the compound 6,7-dinitro-1,4-dihydroquinoxaline-2,3-dione (DNQX), a well-established antagonist of ionotropic glutamate receptor GluA2. DNQX was synthesized, and its two acidic constants were determined by UV–vis spectroscopy. The experimental p K a of 6.99 ± 0.02 and 10.57 ± 0.01 indicate that DNQX mainly exists as an anionic form (DNQXA1) in physiological media, which was also confirmed by 1 H NMR analysis. Five computational methods were applied for estimating the theoretical p K a values of DNQX, including B3LYP, M06-2X, ωB97XD, and CBS-QB3, which were able to provide reasonable estimates for p K a associated with DNQX. Molecular dynamics studies have demonstrated that DNQXA1′ binds more effectively to the pocket of the GluA2 than neutral DNQX, and this fact is coherent to the interactions between amidic oxygens and Arg845 being the main interactions of this host–guest system. Moreover, interaction of GluA2 with endogenous glutamate is stronger than that with DNQXA1, which is in agreement with literature. To the best of our knowledge, we report herein an unprecedented approach involving acidity of the antagonist DNQX, as well as the possible implications in binding to GluA2.

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