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Exploring structure-activity relationships of tricyclic farnesyltransferase inhibitors using ECLiPS libraries.

The development of structure-activity relationships (SARs) relating to the function of a biological protein is often a long and protracted undertaking when using an iterative medicinal chemistry approach. High throughput screening of ECLiPS (Encoded Combinatorial Libraries on Polymeric Support) libraries can be used to simplify this process. In this paper, we illustrate how a large ECLiPS library of 26,908 compounds, based on a tricyclic core structure, was used to define a multitude of SARs for the oncogenic target, farnesyltransferase (FTase). This library, FT-2, was prepared using a split-and-pool approach in which small molecules are constructed on resin that contains tag/linker constructs to track the synthetic process [1-5] Highly defined SARs were produced from this screen that enhanced our understanding of FTase binding site interactions. The pivotal compounds culled from this library were potent in both cell-free and cell-based FTase assays, selective over the closely related enzyme, geranylgeranyltransferase I (GGTase I), and inhibited the adherent-independent growth of a transformed cell line.

Alkyl and Aryl Transferases↗

Analytical techniques for small molecule solid phase synthesis.

Although resin-based chemistry offers many practical advantages over conventional solution phase for the synthesis of combinatorial libraries, effective monitoring of reactions conducted on the support remains a challenge. A number of techniques have been developed to enable the analysis of solid phase organic synthesis either by monitoring the resin-bound species directly or by the analysis of small quantities of material cleaved from the support. This review outlines some of the principles of the various techniques for the analysis of intermediates and products obtained from solid-phase chemistry.

Combinatorial Chemistry Techniques↗

Designing targeted libraries with genetic algorithms.

In combinatorial synthesis, molecules are assembled by linking chemically similar fragments. Because the number of available chemical fragments often greatly exceeds the number that can be used in one synthetic experiment, one needs a rational method for choosing a subset of desirable fragments. If a combinatorial library is to be targeted against a particular biological activity, virtual screening methods can be used to predict which molecules in a virtual library are most likely to be active. When the number of possible molecules in a virtual library is very large, genetic algorithms (GAs) or simulated annealing can be used to quickly find high-scoring molecules by sampling a small subset of the total combinatorial space. We previously demonstrated how a GA can be used to select a subset of fragments for a combinatorial library, and we used topology-based methods of scoring. Here we extend that earlier work in three ways. (1) We demonstrate use of the GA with 3D scoring methods developed in our laboratory. (2) We show that the approach of assembling libraries from fragments in high-scoring molecules is a reasonable one. (3) We compare results from a library-based GA to those from a molecule-based GA.

Algorithms↗

Chemical genomics strategy for the discovery of new anticancer agents.

Chemical genomics represents a cooperation of biology and chemistry to identify and intervene the biological targets. Small molecules with diverse structural characteristics should be used to validate the target through interfering with the biological processes. Because of the limitation of existing chemical libraries, the diversity can be exploited using both the molecular design techniques; structure-based design and ligand-based design. These methods can guide the selection of small molecules with optimal binding properties to desired biological targets. Studies of potential molecular targets for novel anticancer drug discovery including in silico screening, QSAR, and de novo design demonstrated the importance of chemical genomics strategy to find the chemical probes and drug lead compounds.

Animals↗

Bioactive peptides based on diversity libraries, supramolecular chemistry and rational design: a new class of peptide drugs. Introduction.

A new class of pharmaceutical molecules--synthetic vaccines, synthetic diagnostics and peptide drugs--are emerging based on recent advances of peptide libraries, supramolecular chemistry and rational design. The molecules of this growing class have exciting potential, not met by classical drugs based on small molecules or recombinant proteins.

Combinatorial Chemistry Techniques↗

Blocking angiogenesis and tumorigenesis with GFA-116, a synthetic molecule that inhibits binding of vascular endothelial growth factor to its receptor.

A small synthetic library of cyclohexapeptidomimetic calixarenes was prepared to identify disrupters of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) binding to its receptor that inhibits angiogenesis. From this library, we discovered GFA-116, which potently inhibits (125)I-VEGF binding to Flk-1 in Flk-1-overexpressing NIH 3T3 cells and human prostate tumor cells with an IC(50) of 750 nM. This inhibition is highly selective for VEGF in that (125)I- platelet-derived growth factor binding to its receptor is not affected. GFA-116 inhibits VEGF-stimulated Flk-1 tyrosine phosphorylation and subsequent activation of Erk1/2 mitogen-activated protein kinases. Furthermore, epidermal growth factor, platelet-derived growth factor, and fibroblast growth factor-dependent stimulation of Erk1/2 phosphorylation are not affected at concentrations as high as 10 microM. In vitro, GFA-116 inhibits angiogenesis as measured by inhibition of migration and formation of capillary-like structures by human endothelial cells as well as suppression of microvessel outgrowth in rat aortic rings and rat cornea angiogenesis. In vivo, GFA-116 (50 mpk/day) inhibits tumor growth and angiogenesis as measured by CD31 staining of A-549 human lung tumors in nude mice. Furthermore, GFA-116 is also effective at inhibiting tumor growth and metastasis to the lung of B16-F10 melanoma cells injected into immunocompetent mice. Taken together, these results demonstrate that a synthetic molecule capable of disrupting the binding of VEGF to its receptor selectively inhibits VEGF-dependent signaling and suppresses angiogenesis and tumorigenesis.

Angiogenesis Inhibitors↗

Supertargeted chemistry: identifying relationships between molecular structures and their sub-cellular distribution.

Supertargeted chemistry is the study of how chemical structures localize or direct molecules to specific sub-cellular compartments in living cells. Supertargeting can be used to increase the activity or specificity of an inhibitor against its target, by concentrating the inhibitor in the particular organelle where the target is active. But, unlike structure-activity relationships, structure-localization relationships are not a simple function of compound concentration. Various aspects of mitochondrial physiology, proteomics and pharmacology have made this the organelle of choice for supertargeting studies. While exploration of supertargeting strategies to this and the other organelles has been limited, combinatorial chemical libraries of fluorescent molecules are beginning to illuminate new supertargeting mechanisms at the sub-cellular level. Moreover, predictive approaches that determine the relationship between a molecule's features and sub-cellular localization are being developed in the related field of functional genomics. Applied to the small molecules, such strategies could prove useful for predicting structure-localization relationships amongst large libraries of compounds.

Animals↗

Agonists of the follicle stimulating hormone receptor from an encoded thiazolidinone library.

The design, synthesis, characterization, and screening of a large, encoded thiazolidinone library are described. Three sets of 35 building blocks were combined by encoded split-pool synthesis to give a library containing more than 42 000 members. Building block selection was based in part on a novel small molecule follicle stimulating hormone receptor agonist hit and in part for diversity. HPLC/MS techniques were applied at the single-bead level to build confidence in the reliability of library construction. Application of two distinct screening strategies resulted in the identification of compounds with significantly improved potency over the initial hit. This work demonstrates the versatility of encoded libraries for preparing a large number of analogues of a given hit while simultaneously generating a large collection of compounds for screening against other targets.

Aldehydes↗

Identification of small molecule antagonists of the human mas-related gene-X1 receptor.

The recently identified mas-related-gene (MRG) family of receptors, located primarily in sensory neurons of the dorsal root ganglion, has been implicated in the perception of pain. Thus, antagonists of this class of receptors have been postulated to be useful analgesics. Toward this end, we developed a cell-based beta-lactamase (BLA) reporter gene assay to identify small molecule antagonists of the human MRG-X1 receptor from a library of compounds. Single-cell clones expressing functional receptors were selected using the BLA reporter gene technology. The EC50 for the MRG agonist peptide, BAM15, appeared to be comparable between the BLA assay and the intracellular Ca2+ transient assays in these cells. Ultra high-throughput screening of approximately 1 million compounds in a 1.8-microl cell-based BLA reporter gene assay was conducted in a 3456-well plate format. Compounds exhibiting potential antagonist profile in the BLA assay were confirmed in the second messenger Ca2+ transient assay. A cell-based receptor trafficking assay was used to further validate the mechanism of action of these compounds. Several classes of compounds, particularly the 2,3-disubstituted azabicyclo-octanes, appear to be relatively potent antagonists at the human MRG-X1 receptors, as confirmed by the receptor trafficking assay and radioligand binding studies. Furthermore, the structure-activity relationship reveals that within this class of compounds, the diphenylmethyl moiety is constant at the 2-substituent, whereas the 3-substituent is directly correlated with the antagonist activity of the compound.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

Data processing and exchange tools to facilitate chemical genetic screening processes.

Due to the development of chemical genomics, the screening of chemical libraries is used more and more by research laboratories to identify small molecule inhibitors or activators of cell functions. To facilitate the treatment and archiving of screening data, we developed a multiuser web application called Elisa Data Exchanger (EDE). The program is able to automatically identify which chemical compounds were tested. Several data exchange formats can be generated for visualization, printing, charting, or exporting to chemical analysis software. These data exchange functions allow for a comparison of results obtained from screening several targets in order to select the most specific compounds. EDE is freely available online at https://ibph.pharma.univ-montpl.fr/ede/ (login: evalede, password: loginede).

Combinatorial Chemistry Techniques↗

Trends in virtual combinatorial library design.

Recent developments in combinatorial molecular design using virtual screening methods are summarised. These include similarity-based compound clustering techniques, structure-based docking and scoring, and fragment-based de novo design. Three major trends have been identified: i) the design of small target-focused compound libraries yielding activity-enriched sets of molecules; ii) advanced prediction methods for "drug-like" molecular properties complement activity predictions in the library design process, forming a multi-dimensional objective function; iii) "cherry picking" of selected products is increasingly used in lead generation and optimisation compared to purely educt-driven library design methods aiming at maximising structural diversity.

Algorithms↗

Restoring p53-dependent tumor suppression.

p53 represents an ideal target for anti-cancer drug design, because p53 is mutated in more than half of human tumors. Most of the remaining tumors, although carrying wild-type p53, have defects in the p53-mediated apoptotic pathway. Activation of p53 activity by either chemotherapy or radiotherapy induces p53-dependent apoptosis in tumor cells with wild-type p53. Supplying exogenous wild-type p53 in cancer cells by gene delivery is effective in suppressing tumor growth of both mutant and wild-type p53-containing tumors. Blockage of p53 degradation pathways either by overexpression of ARF or interruption of MDM2:p53 interaction is effective in inducing p53 triggered tumor cell death. Since unlike most other tumor suppressor genes, mutant p53 is over expressed in tumor cells, a promising approach involves restoring tumor-suppressing function to mutant p53. The activity of the mutant p53 in tumor cells is restorable based on the fact that PAb241 antibody against the carboxy-terminus of p53 and peptides corresponding to the p53 carboxy-terminus can restore specific DNA-binding ability to some mutant p53 proteins. High throughout screening of chemical libraries has led to the identification of a group of small synthetic molecules such as CP-31398, which can restore p53 function to mutant p53 by stabilizing the active conformation of the protein that is destabilized in many mutants. Subsequent identification of PRIMA-1 provides further evidence to the possibility of developing anti-cancer drugs that may rescue mutant p53. Further understanding of the mechanisms by which CP-31398 and PRIMA-1 restore p53 activity may not only lead to discovery of more potent analogs but may also suggest new strategies for p53-targeting in tumor therapy.

Antineoplastic Agents↗

Interrupting malaria transmission by genetic manipulation of anopheline mosquitoes.

Malaria ranks among the deadliest infectious diseases that kills more than one million persons every year. The mosquito is an obligatory vector for malaria transmission. In the mosquito, Plasmodium undergoes a complex series of developmental events that includes transformation into several distinct morphological forms and the crossing of two different epithelia--midgut and salivary gland. Circumstantial evidence suggests that crossing of the epithelia requires specific interactions between Plasmodium and epithelial surface molecules. By use of a phage display library we have identified a small peptide-SM1--that binds to the surfaces of the mosquito midgut and salivary glands. Transgenic Anopheles stephensi mosquitoes expressing a SM1 tetramer from a blood-inducible and gut-specific promoter are substantially impaired in their ability to sustain parasite development and transmission. A second effector gene, phospholipase A2, also impairs parasite transmission in transgenic mosquitoes. These findings have important implications for the development of new strategies for malaria control.

Animals↗

Toward designing drug-like libraries: a novel computational approach for prediction of drug feasibility of compounds.

Prediction of the degree of drug-like character in small molecules is of great industrial interest. The major barrier, however, is the lack of a definition for drug-like character. We used the concept of the multilevel chemical compatibility (MLCC) between a compound and a drug library as a measure of the drug-like character of a compound. The rationale is that the local chemical environment of each atom or group of atoms in a compound largely contributes to the stability, toxicity, and metabolism in vivo. A systematic comparison of the local environments within a compound and those within the existing drugs provides a basis for determining whether and how much a compound is drug-like. We applied the MLCC calculations to four test sets: top selling drugs, compounds under biological testing prior to the preclinical test, anticancer drugs, and compounds known to have poor drug-like character. The following conclusions were obtained: (1) A convergent number of unique local structure types were found in the analysis of the library of the existing drugs. It suggests that the current drug library contains about 80% of all the viable types; therefore, discovery of a drug with new local structures is only an event of relatively small probability. (2) The method is highly selective in discerning drug-like compounds: most of the top drugs are predicted to be drug-like, about one-quarter of the biological testing compounds are drug-like, and about one-fifth of the anticancer drugs are drug-like. (3) The method also correctly predicted that none of the known problematic compounds are drug-like. (4) The method is fast enough for computational screening of virtual combinatorial chemistry libraries and databases of available compounds.

Combinatorial Chemistry Techniques↗

A credit-card library approach for disrupting protein-protein interactions.

Protein-protein interfaces are prominent in many therapeutically important targets. Using small organic molecules to disrupt protein-protein interactions is a current challenge in chemical biology. An important example of protein-protein interactions is provided by the Myc protein, which is frequently deregulated in human cancers. Myc belongs to the family of basic helix-loop-helix leucine zipper (bHLH-ZIP) transcription factors. It is biologically active only as heterodimer with the bHLH-ZIP protein Max. Herein, we report a new strategy for the disruption of protein-protein interactions that has been corroborated through the design and synthesis of a small parallel library composed of 'credit-card' compounds. These compounds are derived from a planar, aromatic scaffold and functionalized with four points of diversity. From a 285 membered library, several hits were obtained that disrupted the c-Myc-Max interaction and cellular functions of c-Myc. The IC50 values determined for this small focused library for the disruption of Myc-Max dimerization are quite potent, especially since small molecule antagonists of protein-protein interactions are notoriously difficult to find. Furthermore, several of the compounds were active at the cellular level as shown by their biological effects on Myc action in chicken embryo fibroblast assays. In light of our findings, this approach is considered a valuable addition to the armamentarium of new molecules being developed to interact with protein-protein interfaces. Finally, this strategy for disrupting protein-protein interactions should prove applicable to other families of proteins.

Animals↗

Structural requirements for the biosynthesis of backbone cyclic peptide libraries.

BACKGROUND: Combinatorial methods for the production of molecular libraries are an important source of ligand diversity for chemical biology. Synthetic methods focus on the production of small molecules that must traverse the cell membrane to elicit a response. Genetic methods enable intracellular ligand production, but products must typically be large molecules in order to withstand cellular catabolism. Here we describe an intein-based approach to biosynthesis of backbone cyclic peptide libraries that combines the strengths of synthetic and genetic methods. RESULTS: Through site-directed mutagenesis we show that the DnaE intein from Synechocystis sp. PCC6803 is very promiscuous with respect to peptide substrate composition, and can generate cyclic products ranging from four to nine amino acids. Libraries with five variable amino acids and either one or four fixed residues were prepared, yielding between 10(7) and 10(8) transformants. The majority of randomly selected clones from each library gave cyclic products. CONCLUSIONS: We have developed a versatile method for producing intracellular libraries of small, stable cyclic peptides. Genetic encoding enables facile manipulation of vast numbers of compounds, while low molecular weight ensures ready pharmacophore identification. The demonstrated flexibility of the method towards both peptide length and composition makes it a valuable addition to existing methods for generating ligand diversity.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

Micro-X-ray fluorescence as a general high-throughput screening method for catalyst discovery and small molecule recognition.

A powerful high-throughput screening technique is described for the rapid screening of bead-based libraries for catalyst discovery and molecular recognition. Micro-X-ray fluorescence (MXRF) screens materials for elemental composition with mesoscale analysis. This method is nondestructive and requires minimal sample preparation and no special tags for analysis, and the screening time is dependent on the desired sensitivity. The speed, sensitivity, and simplicity of MXRF as a high-throughput screening technique were applied to screen bead-based libraries of oligopeptides for phosphate hydrolysis catalysts and molecular recognition of selective receptors for the degradation products and analogues of chemical warfare agents. This paper demonstrates the analytical or HTS capability of MXRF for combinatorial screening. It is meant only to show the capabilities of MXRF and is not meant as an exhaustive study of the catalyst and molecular recognition systems presented.

Catalysis↗