Combinatorial Chemistry & High Throughput Screening - Volume 19, Issue 3, 2016

The development of new anti-cancer therapeutic agents is necessary to improve antitumor efficacy and reduce toxicities. Here we report using a systematic anticancer drug screening approach we developed previously, to concurrently screen colon and glioma cancer cell lines for 2000 compounds with known bioactivity and 1920 compounds with unknown activity. The hits specific to each tumor cell line were then selected, and further tested with the same cells transfected with EGFP (Enhanced Green Fluorescent Protein) alone. By comparing the percentage of signal reduction from the same cells transfected with the sensor-conjugated reporter system; hits preferably causing apoptosis were identified. Among the known lead compounds, many cardiac glycosides used as cardiotonic drugs were found to effectively and specifically kill colon cancer cells, while statins (hypolipidemic agents) used as cholesterol lowering drugs were relatively more effective in killing glioma cells.

Herein, we describe a simple, four-step process for the preparation of 1,2,3-triazino[1,6- a]quinazolin-13-ones. This method involves ring-opening, quinazoline-forming condensation, reduction, diazotization accompanied by rapid intramolecular cyclization in the last step afforded the desired products with structurally complex heterocyclic core in excellent to high yields.

A series of rosin based esters have been synthesized from dehydroabietic acid and maleopimaric acid, respectively. Their structures were confirmed by FT-IR, 1H NMR, 13C NMR and single crystal X-ray diffraction. Their antifeedant activities against armyworm were examined by leaf plate method. Methyl ester of dehydroabietic acid and maleopimaric acid were crystallized in orthorhombic system with cell dimensions of a = 26.352 [5] Å, b = 6.1020 [12] Å, c = 11.812 [2] Å and a = 7.9216 [11] Å, b = 11.9912 [16] Å, c = 23.425 [3] Å, respectively. They contained classic tricyclic hydrophenanthrene skeleton. The antifeedant results indicated that most rosin-based esters exhibited significant antifeedant activities at a concentration of 0.01 g mL-1. Their feeding deterrence values were above 70% after 24h. The antifeedant activities for rosin-based esters increased with the growth of chain length of alcohol except (Ia). Some armyworm were found dead during the antifeedant activity test, by which we speculated that these synthetic rosinbased esters had stomach poison activities against armyworm.

Picrorhiza kurroa is an important herb in Indian medicine and contains cucurbitacins, flavonoids, phenolics, iridoid-glucoside and their derivatives as active constituents for the treatment of indigestion, fever, hepatitis, cancer, liver and respiratory diseases. Extensive use of P. kurroa needs detailed analysis and recognition of chemical diversity, is of great importance to evaluate their role as quality control markers. In the present study, comprehensive metabolic profiling of crude extracts of leaves and rhizomes of P. kurroa was carried out using NMR, HPTLC and LC-MS/MS. Primary and secondary metabolites were unambiguously identified along with a new report of monoterpenic glycoside (1-β-D-glucopyranosyl)-8-hydroxy-3,7-dimethyl-oct-2(E),6(E)–dienoate) in P. Kurroa. Significant qualitative differences with respect to the secondary metabolites were noticed between the leaves and rhizomes tissues. Leaves contained more cucurbitacins and flavonoids while iridoids were present more in rhizomes. The comprehensive chemical profiling is expected to give an idea of chemical diversity and quality of P. kurroa, for their ultimate utilisation in various applications.

ADAMTS4 (Aggrecanase-1) is an important enzyme, which belongs to ADAMTS family. Aggrecanase-1 is involved in aggrecan degradation of articular cartilage in osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. Overall variability of S1’ domain of ADAMTS4 has been the main selectivity determinant to design the unique inhibitors. 34 inhibitors from Binding database and literature were used to develop the pharmacophore model. The five featured pharmacophore model AHHRR had the best survival score of 3.493 and post-hoc score of 2.545, indicating that the model is highly reliable. The 3D-QSAR acquired had excellent r2 value of 0.99 and GH score of 0.839. The validated pharmacophore model was used for insilico screening of Asinex and ZINC database for finding the potential lead compounds. ZINC00987406 and ASN04459656 which pose high glide score i.e >7 Kcal/mol and H-bond and hydrophobic interactions in the S1‘loop residues of ADAMTS4 were subjected to Molecular Dynamics Simulation studies. Molecular dynamic simulation result indicates that the RMSD and RMSF of backbone atoms for the above complexes were within the limit of 2.0 A#154;. These compounds can be potential candidates for osteoarthritis by inhibiting ADAMTS4.

Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) is a tyrosine kinase with a key role in cell proliferation, death and differentiation. Mutations in EGFR, including substitution of Thr790 by methionine and Leu858 by arginine (T790M/L858R), lead to a lung cancer that is resistant against first generation inhibitors. In fact, second generation inhibitors were developed, but they proved to have had severe side effects because of the significant potency to suppress the wild type protein just as much. To resolve the problem, a step-by-step rational virtual screening was employed over almost sixty million compounds of PubChem Compound Database to filter out selective inhibitor(s) of T790M/L858R subtype. Consequently, the compound CID 133077 was observed, an active metabolite of Axitirome and also a cholesterol lowering prodrug. Selecting this compound can be explained by the oxamic acid part of molecule. Hence, administration of Axitirome or other compounds which contain oxamic acid is suggested in cases with EGFR T790M/L858R drug resistance.

Tuberculosis (TB) is an infection with global impact that over time demonstrates enormously high mortality rates. The vital need for improving novel and efficient anti-TB drugs is caused by the rising rate of appearance of Multi Drug Resistant (MDR) strains to the frequently utilized drugs.In addition, the longer periods of therapy and healing, mainly in the immune compromised patients aggrevates the situation. Recent studies indicate that computer-based techniques have been used successfully in the antibacterial research. In our current approach, utilizing combined pattern of computer-based methods as fragment-based de novo design, structure-based docking and scoring, in addition to similaritybased compound searching, led to introduce seven in silico designed compounds with probable antimycobacterial properties. Then, we investigated their potency against sensitive and resistant strains of Mycobacterium sp. in vitro. Findings resulted from antimycobacterial tests and MTT assay indicated that two compounds, 1-amino-4-(phenylamino) anthracene-9,10-dione and 5-fluoroindoline-2,3-dione have useful profile and maybe good candidates for developing novel antimycobacterial drugs.

Human meprin-α and-β are important regulators of angiogenesis, cancer, inflammation, fibrosis, and neurodegenerative diseases and hence important therapeutic targets. Meprins are the only astacin proteases that are expressed in membrane-bound and secreted form. The cleavage specificity of human meprins is similar in certain cases but differs markedly in others. The inhibitor selectivity of human meprins is controlled by the specific residues involved in binding at the active-site cleft of the proteases. Meprins are inhibited by various small molecular inhibitors as well as macromolecular endogenous inhibitors, making them good drug targets. In the current study, molecular dynamics simulation was performed for 10 ns on ten systems consisting of two apoenzymes of meprin -α/β and eight complexes of human meprin-α and -β complexed to four inhibitors with different metal binding moieties and comparable Ki values. These simulation studies helped to elucidate the molecular details of how several parameters influence protein–inhibitor binding affinity. Analysis of the interaction energies of the protein–inhibitor complexes revealed the diverse binding nature of this series of inhibitors. Several structural segments of human meprins exhibited certain conformational changes during the simulation time course. Among the inhibitors studied captopril had a different disposition in the meprin-bound complexes compared to the other three inhibitors, namely Pro- Leu-Gly-hydroxamate, galardin and EDTA. Comparison of the interaction energies for each system helped us to conclude that the hydroxamic acid-based inhibitors are the most potent inhibitors of meprins.