Cellular Quantitative Structure–Activity Relationship (Cell-QSAR): Conceptual Dissection of Receptor Binding and Intracellular Disposition in Antifilarial Activities of Selwood Antimycins

[Image: see text] We present the cellular quantitative structure–activity relationship (cell-QSAR) concept that adapts ligand-based and receptor-based 3D-QSAR methods for use with cell-level activities. The unknown intracellular drug disposition is accounted for by the disposition function (DF), a model-based, nonlinear function of a drug’s lipophilicity, acidity, and other properties. We conceptually combined the DF with our multispecies, multimode version of the frequently used ligand-based comparative molecular field analysis (CoMFA) method, forming a single correlation function for fitting the cell-level activities. The resulting cell-QSAR model was applied to the Selwood data on filaricidal activities of antimycin analogues. Their molecules are flexible, ionize under physiologic conditions, form different intramolecular H-bonds for neutral and ionized species, and cross several membranes to reach unknown receptors. The calibrated cell-QSAR model is significantly more predictive than other models lacking the disposition part and provides valuable structure optimization clues by factorizing the cell-level activity of each compound into the contributions of the receptor binding and disposition.