Cage amines as the stopper inhibitors of cholinesterases.

Cage amines 1-4 are potent peripheral anionic site-bound reversible inhibitors of both acetylcholinesterase and butyrylcholinesterase. Cage amines 1-3 are selective butyrylcholinesterase inhibitor versus acetylcholinesterase. For both enzymes, the -log K(i) values linearly correlate with the difference of substituted phenyl radius of cage amines (-log K(i)=5.4+3.4Deltagamma for acetylcholinesterase, -log K(i)=5.9+3.2Deltagamma for butyrylcholinesterase). Moreover, the relationship between the enzymes and cage amines mimics that between bottles and stoppers.