Synthesis and Cytotoxic Activity of Some Novel Dihyrobenzo[h]pyrano[3,2-c]chromene Derivatives

Discovery of anticancer agents with c-Met inhibitory potential by virtual and experimental screening of a chemical library

c-Met receptor tyrosine kinase has recently emerged as an important target with therapeutic implications in pancreatic cancer. In this study, we carried out a docking virtual screening on an in-house library of 441 synthesized compounds and selected the compounds with the best interactions with the c-Met protein to be subjected to experimental tests. Ten compounds belonging to 3 different classes of chemical structures were selected for this purpose and their antiproliferative effects were studied against 4 pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) cell lines including AsPC-1, Suit-2, Panc-1 and Mia-Paca-2 cells, primary PDAC cells and also c-Met amplified EBC-1 cell line by sulforhodamine-B assay. Apoptosis induction was examined by Hoechst 33258 staining and annexin V-FITC/propidium iodide flow cytometric assay. The best compound was also assayed in three-dimensional cultures of AsPC-1 cells and its c-Met inhibitory potential was studied by immunoblotting and a homogenous time resolved fluorescence (HTRF) assay. The compound with a phenanthrotriazine hydrazinyl scaffold bearing nitrophenyl pendant (PhTH) was the most active derivative, with IC50 values in the range of 5-8 μM. This compound exerted antiproliferative effect against AsPC-1 cells also in the presence of hepatocyte growth factor (HGF). PhTH induced apoptosis, dose-dependently inhibited spheroid growth, inhibited c-Met activity in cell-free HTRF assay and also inhibited the phosphorylation of c-Met and its downstream effector ERK1/2 in AsPC-1 cells. Molecular docking and dynamics simulation and MM-PBSA analysis confirmed close interactions of PhTH with c-Met kinase domain. Some of the tested compounds in this study seem to be potential c-Met inhibitors with promising activities against PDAC cells.

Synthesis and pharmacological properties of polysubstituted 2-amino-4H-pyran-3-carbonitrile derivatives

2-Amino-3-cyano-4H-chromenes are structural core motifs that received increasing attention in the last years due to their interesting potential pharmacological properties. In this review, the synthetic methods for these compounds are classified based on the type of catalyst in the pertinent reactions. In addition, the wide range of pharmacological properties of these compounds is covered in a separate section.