Analysis of molecular glue-induced ternary structures indicate that there are 2 main pathways of how ternary structure is formed; Path 1) a protein–protein binary interface is formed first and then the complex incorporates a small molecule ligand at the interface or Path 2) small molecule binds to a protein partner first, which leads to altered protein surface properties, much like the effects of post-translational modification, making this surface available for association with another protein

We summarize >100 molecular glue-induced ternary complexes, Group 1) features interactions between proteins with well-folded domains, Group 2) one of the binding partners is a stretch of residues that contains a specific pattern for binding based on interaction mode.