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Liu J, Ye W, Xu JP, Wang HT, Li XF, Wang WY, Zhou ZZ. Discovery of novel trimethoxyphenylbenzo[d]oxazoles as dual tubulin/PDE4 inhibitors capable of inducing apoptosis at G2/M phase arrest in glioma and lung cancer cells. Eur J Med Chem 2021; 224:113700. [PMID: 34311158 DOI: 10.1016/j.ejmech.2021.113700] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/18/2021] [Revised: 06/09/2021] [Accepted: 07/10/2021] [Indexed: 10/20/2022]
Abstract
To discover PDE4/tubulin dual inhibitors with novel skeleton structures, 7-trimethoxyphenylbenzo[d]oxazoles 4a-u and 4-trimethoxyphenylbenzo[d]oxazoles 5a-h were designed and synthesized by migrating the trimethoxyphenyl group of TH03 to the benzo[d]oxazole moiety. Among these compounds, approximately half of them displayed good antiproliferative activities against glioma (U251) and lung cancer (A549 and H460) cell lines. The structure-activity relationships of trimethoxyphenylbenzo[d]oxazoles led to the identification of 4r bearing indol-5-yl side-chain as a novel dual PDE4/tubulin inhibitor, which exhibited satisfactory antiproliferative activities against glioma (IC50 = 300 ± 50 nM) and lung cancer (average IC50 = 39.5 nM) cells. Further investigations revealed that 4r induced apoptosis at G2/M phase arrest and disrupted the microtubule network. The preliminary mechanism of action showed that 4r down-regulated the expression of cyclin B1 and its upstream regulator gene cdc25C in A549.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jie Liu
- Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of New Drug Screening, School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, 510515, China
| | - Wan Ye
- Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of New Drug Screening, School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, 510515, China
| | - Jiang-Ping Xu
- Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of New Drug Screening, School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, 510515, China; Key Laboratory of Mental Health of the Ministry Education, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, 510515, China
| | - Hai-Tao Wang
- Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of New Drug Screening, School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, 510515, China
| | - Xiao-Fang Li
- Department of Hematology, Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, 510515, PR China
| | - Wen-Ya Wang
- Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of New Drug Screening, School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, 510515, China.
| | - Zhong-Zhen Zhou
- Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of New Drug Screening, School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, 510515, China; Pharmacy Department, Zhujiang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, 510515, China.
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