Design, synthesis, and evaluation of novel ursolic acid derivatives as HIF-1α inhibitors with anticancer potential

An overview of PROTACs targeting MDM2 as a novel approach for cancer therapy

MDM2 genes amplification or altered expression is commonly observed in various cancers bearing wild-type TP53. Directly targeting the p53-binding pocket of MDM2 to activate the p53 pathway represents a promising therapeutic approach. Despite the development of numerous potent MDM2 inhibitors that have advanced into clinical trials, their utility is frequently hampered by drug resistance and hematologic toxicity such as neutropenia and thrombocytopenia. The emergence of PROTAC technology has revolutionized drug discovery and development, with applications in both preclinical and clinical research. Harnessing the power of PROTAC molecules to achieve MDM2 targeted degradation and p53 reactivation holds significant promise for cancer therapy. In this review, we summarize representative MDM2 PROTAC degraders and provide insights for researchers investigating MDM2 proteins and the p53 pathway.

Synthesis and structure-activity relationship studies of fusidic acid derivatives as anti-inflammatory agents for acute lung injury

Acute lung injury (ALI) are severe forms of diffuse lung disease that impose a substantial health burden all over the world. In the United States, approximately 190,000 cases per year of ALI each year, with an associated 74,500 deaths per year. Anti-inflammatory therapy has become a reasonable approach for the treatment of patients with ALI. In this study, fusidic acid derivatives were used to design new anti-inflammatory compounds with high pharmacological activity and low toxicity. A total of 30 new fusidic acid derivatives were discovered, synthesized, and screened for their anti-inflammatory activity against lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-treated RAW264.7 cells. Of them, b2 was found to be the most active, with a higher efficiency compared with fusidic acid and celecoxib in 10 μM. In vitro, we further measured b2 inhibited inflammatory factor NO (IC50 = 5.382 ± 0.655 μM), IL-6 (IC50 = 7.767 ± 0.871 μM), and TNF-α (IC50 = 7.089 ± 0.775 μM) and b2 inhibited inflammatory cytokines COX-2 and iNOS, ROS production, NF-κB/MAPK and Bax/Bcl-2 signaling pathway pathway. In vivo,b2 attenuated ALI pathological changes and inhibited inflammatory cytokines COX-2 and iNOS in lung tissue and NF-κB/MAPK and Bax/Bcl-2 signaling pathway. In conclusion, b2 may be a promising anti-inflammatory lead compound.

Synthesis of Oleanolic Acid-Dithiocarbamate Conjugates and Evaluation of Their Broad-Spectrum Antitumor Activities

Efficient and mild synthetic routes for bioactive natural product derivatives are of current interest for drug discovery. Herein, on the basis of the pharmacophore hybrid strategy, we report a two-step protocol to obtain a series of structurally novel oleanolic acid (OA)-dithiocarbamate conjugates in mild conditions with high yields. Moreover, biological evaluations indicated that representative compound 3e exhibited the most potent and broad-spectrum antiproliferative effects against Panc1, A549, Hep3B, Huh-7, HT-29, and Hela cells with low cytotoxicity on normal cells. In terms of the IC₅₀ values, these OA-dithiocarbamate conjugates were up to 30-fold more potent than the natural product OA. These compounds may be promising hit compounds for the development of novel anti-cancer drugs.

Ursolic Acid Analogs as Potential Therapeutics for Cancer

Ursolic acid (UA) is a pentacyclic triterpene isolated from a large variety of vegetables, fruits and many traditional medicinal plants. It is a structural isomer of Oleanolic Acid. The medicinal application of UA has been explored extensively over the last two decades. The diverse pharmacological properties of UA include anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, antiviral, antioxidant, anti-proliferative, etc. Especially, UA holds a promising position, potentially, as a cancer preventive and therapeutic agent due to its relatively non-toxic properties against normal cells but its antioxidant and antiproliferative activities against cancer cells. Cell culture studies have shown interference of UA with multiple pharmacological and molecular targets that play a critical role in many cells signaling pathways. Although UA is considered a privileged natural product, its clinical applications are limited due to its low absorption through the gastro-intestinal track and rapid elimination. The low bioavailability of UA limits its use as a therapeutic drug. To overcome these drawbacks and utilize the importance of the scaffold, many researchers have been engaged in designing and developing synthetic analogs of UA via structural modifications. This present review summarizes the synthetic UA analogs and their cytotoxic antiproliferative properties reported in the last two decades.

Ursolic acid: a natural modulator of signaling networks in different cancers

Incidence rate of cancer is estimated to increase by 40% in 2030. Furthermore, the development of resistance against currently available treatment strategies has contributed to the cancer-associated mortality. Scientists are now looking for the solutions that could help prevent the disease occurrence and could provide a pain-free treatment alternative for cancers. Therefore, efforts are now put to find a potent natural compound that could sever this purpose. Ursolic acid (UA), a triterpene acid, has potential to inhibit the tumor progression and induce sensitization to conventional treatment drugs has been documented. Though, UA is a hydrophobic compound therefore it is usually chemically modified to increase its bioavailability prior to administration. However, a thorough literature indicating its mechanism of action and limitations for its use at clinical level was not reviewed. Therefore, the current study was designed to highlight the potential mechanism of UA, its anti-cancer properties, and potential applications as therapeutic compound. This endeavour is a valuable contribution in understanding the hurdles preventing the translation of its potential at clinical level and provides foundations to design new studies that could help enhance its bioavailability and anti-cancer potential for various cancers.

Synthesis and evaluation of anticancer activity of quillaic acid derivatives: A cell cycle arrest and apoptosis inducer through NF-κB and MAPK pathways

A series of quillaic acid derivatives with different substituents on the 28-carboxyl group were designed and synthesized. Five human cancer cell lines (HCT116, BEL7402, HepG2, SW620, and MCF-7) were evaluated for their antitumor activity in vitro. Some of the tested derivatives showed improved antiproliferative activity compared to the lead compound, quillaic acid. Among them, compound E (IC₅₀ = 2.46 ± 0.44 μM) showed the strongest antiproliferative activity against HCT116 cells; compared with quillaic acid (IC₅₀ > 10 μM), its efficacy against HCT116 cancer cells was approximately 4-fold higher than that of quillaic acid. Compound E also induces cell cycle arrest and apoptosis by modulating NF-κB and MAPK pathways. Therefore, the development of compound E is certainly valuable for anti-tumor applications.

Water-Extracted Prunella vulgaris Alleviates Endometriosis by Reducing Aerobic Glycolysis

Endometriosis is a chronic inflammatory disorder caused by abnormal adhesion of endometrial tissue to the outside of the uterus. The combination of surgery, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, and hormone treatment is well established therapy for endometriosis, however, case reports have showed that high rates of relapse and unpleasant side effect. For these reasons, recently, the studies have been focused on the Warburg-like metabolic shift of endometriosis. Prunella vulgaris is one of traditionally used herbal medicine for inflammatory disease and the anti-estrogenic effects of P. vulgaris is well-established. Therefore, in this work, we evaluated water-extracted P. vulgaris (PV) as a potential treatment for endometriosis. To this, we artificially induced endometriosis in ovarectomized mice by intra-peritoneal inoculation of uterus extracts. PV was orally administered, and PV significantly alleviated endometriosis, particularly the growth of ectopic endometrial lesions in artificially endometriosis-induced mice. For the mechanism study of anti-endometriosis by PV, we designed an in vitro study using human normal endometrial stromal cells (T-HESCs) and human endometrial cell (12Z) obtained from patients with endometriosis. PV strongly induced the apoptosis of 12Z cells rather than T-HESCs by control the activity or expression of aerobic glycolysis enzymes, such as lactate dehydrogenase A (LDHA), pyruvate dehydrogenase A, and pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase 1/3. In addition, lactate production was enhanced, and oxygen consumption rate was suppressed in 12Z cells upon PV treatment. These changes in aerobic glycolysis eventually caused mitochondrial damage following decreased mitochondrial membrane potential and excessive mitochondrial ROS production. Especially, ulsolic acid (UA), one of the compounds in PV considerably led 12Z cell apoptosis with inhibition of LDHA activity. Therefore, UA could be a major active substance of PV in terms of endometriosis inhibitors. In conclusion, this study provides the evidence that the beneficial efficacy of PV for the prevention/treatment of endometriosis.

Design, synthesis, anticancer activity and mechanism studies of novel 2-amino-4-aryl-pyrimidine derivatives of ursolic acid

A series of novel 2-amino-4-aryl-pyrimidine derivatives of ursolic acid were designed, synthesized, and evaluated for their anticancer activities against four cancer cell lines (MCF-7, HeLa, HepG2, and A549) and a human hepatocyte cell line (LO2) via MTT assay.

Development of natural products for anti-PD-1/PD-L1 immunotherapy against cancer

ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL RELEVANCE

The programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1)/programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) immune checkpoint is one of the most promising therapeutic targets for cancer immunotherapy, but several challenges remain in current anti-PD-1/PD-L1 therapy. Natural products, mainly derived from traditional medicine, could improve and expand anti-PD-1/PD-L1 therapy because of their advantages such as large diversity and multi-target effects.

AIM OF THE STUDY

This review summarize natural products, raw extracts, and traditional medicines with pharmacological effects associated with the PD-1/PD-L1 axis, particularly PD-L1.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Electronic literature databases, including Web of Science, PubMed, and ScienceDirect, and online drugs and chemicals databases, including DrugBank, ZINC, PubChem, STITCH, and CTD, were searched without date limitation by February 2021. 'Natural product or herb or herbal plant or traditional medicine' and 'PD-L1' and 'Cancer immunotherapy' were used as the search keywords. Among 112 articles identified in database searching, 54 articles are full text articles, reporting in silico, in vitro, in vivo and clinical trials. 68 articles included are review articles and grey literature such as thesis and congress abstracts.

RESULTS

Several natural products and traditional medicines have exhibited diverse and multi-functional effects including direct blockade of PD-1/PD-L1 interactions, modulation of PD-L1 expression, and cooperation with PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors.

CONCLUSION

Natural products and traditional medicines can facilitate the development of more effective and acceptable diverse strategies for anti-PD-1/PD-L1 therapy, but further exploration of natural products and pharmaceutical techniques is required.

Investigating the Multitarget Pharmacological Mechanism of Ursolic Acid Acting on Colon Cancer: A Network Pharmacology Approach

Objective

To explore the mechanisms of ursolic acid for treating colon cancer based on network pharmacology.

Method

In this study, the potential targets of ursolic acid against colon cancer were predicted and screened through the TCMSP, SYMMAP, Drug Bank, UNI-PROT, and DISGENET databases. The protein interaction (PPI) network was constructed based on the STRING database, and graphs were drawn with the help of Cytoscape software. GO and KEGG enrichment analyses were performed on the targets by using the DAVID database for biological information annotation.

Results

Ursolic acid has 113 targets in the treatment of colon cancer. The core targets included interleukin-6 (IL-6), mitogen-activated protein kinase 3 (MAPK3), vascular endothelial growth factor receptor (VEGFA), prostaglandin endoperoxide synthase 2 (PTGS2), caspase-3 (CASP3), mitogen-activated protein kinase 8 (MAPK8), tumor necrosis factor (TNF), cyclin D1 (CCND1), JUN, signal transducer and transcriptional activator 3 (STAT3), and other targets. The first 10 pathways related to colon cancer were screened out. The main signaling pathways included the TNF signaling pathway and the AGE-RAGE signaling pathway in diabetic complications and human colon cancer infections.

Conclusion

This study revealed that ursolic acid played a multitarget and multichannel antitumor role by inhibiting the proliferation of tumor cells, inducing apoptosis, and enhancing antiangiogenesis.

Piperazine skeleton in the structural modification of natural products: a review

Piperazine moiety is a cyclic molecule containing two nitrogen atoms in positions 1 and 4, as well as four carbon atoms. Piperazine is one of the most sought heterocyclics for the development of new drug candidates with a wide range of applications. Over 100 molecules with a broad range of bioactivities, including antitumor, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, and other activities, were reviewed. This article reviewed investigations regarding piperazine groups for the modification of natural product derivatives in the last decade, highlighting parameters that affect their biological activity.

Theabrownin Induces Cell Apoptosis and Cell Cycle Arrest of Oligodendroglioma and Astrocytoma in Different Pathways

Theabrownin (TB), a natural compound present in the fresh leaves of green tea, is a potential antitumor agent. However, so far whether and how TB affects glioma is unclear. In this study, we investigated the effect of TB on astroglioma and oligodendroglioma cells. Surprisingly, TB significantly reduced the viabilities of HOG and U251 cells in a dose-dependent manner, which was accompanied by the upregulation of active-Casp-3, Bax, and PTEN; meanwhile, the antiapoptotic gene Bcl-2 was downregulated. In addition, TB treatment induced cell cycle arrest at the G1 and G2/M phases in HOG and U251 cells, respectively. TB treatment caused the downregulating of c-myc, cyclin D, CDK2, and CDK4 and upregulating of p21 and p27 in the HOG cell, while TB increased P53, p21, and p27 levels and decreased the levels of cell cycle regulator proteins such as CDK and cyclin A/B in the U251 cells. Therefore, the c-myc- and P53-related mechanisms were proposed for cell cycle arrest in these two glioma cell lines, respectively. Overall, our findings indicated that TB could be a novel candidate drug for the treatment of gliomas.

Design and linkage optimization of ursane-thalidomide-based PROTACs and identification of their targeted-degradation properties to MDM2 protein

Ursolic acid (UA) is an accessible triterpenoid, widely applied in the design and synthesis of antitumor compounds. However, the mechanism of its anti-tumor effect is still unclear. To verify the molecular mechanism of its biological activity, based on the bifunctional activity of ubiquitination and subsequent proteasomal degradation of the target protein of the proteolysis-targeting chimeras (PROTACs) strategy, here we report the design, synthesis and cellular activity of six UA PROTAC hydrochloride compounds 1A-1F, in which UA acts as the binding ligand of the PROTAC and is linked to thalidomide (E3 ligand) through a series of synthetic linkers. The results revealed that compound 1B, connected with a POE-3 (3-Polyoxyether) possessed remarkable in vitro antitumor activity (with the IC₅₀ value of 0.23 ~ 0.39 μM against A549, Huh7, HepG2). WB results demonstrated that the administration of compound 1B induced significant degradation of MDM2 (only 25% to that of SM1), and promoted the expression of P21 and PUMA proteins, and thus inhibited the proliferation (77.67% of 1B vs 60.37% of CON in G1 phase) and promoted the apoptosis (26.74% of 1B vs 3.35% of CON) of A549 cells. This work demonstrated proof of designing the efficient target protein degradation by UA PROTACs with the POE linkers. In addition, we confirmed that UA possess the characteristic of targeted-binding the protein of murine double minute-2 protein (MDM2). This will lay a foundation for the comprehensive utilization of forest natural compound UA.

Synthesis, anticancer evaluation and mechanism studies of novel indolequinone derivatives of ursolic acid

A series of novel indolequinone derivatives of ursolic acid bearing ester, hydrazide, or amide moieties were designed, synthesized, and screened for their in vitro antiproliferative activities against three cancer cell lines (MCF-7, HeLa, and HepG2) and a normal gastric mucosal cell line (Ges-1). A number of compounds showed significant activity against tested cancer cell lines. Among them, compound 6t exhibited the most potent activity against three cancer cell lines with IC50 values of 1.66 ± 0.21, 3.16 ± 0.24, and 10.35 ± 1.63 µM, respectively, and considerably lower cytotoxicity to Ges-1 cells. Especially, compound 6t could arrest cell cycle at S phase, suppress the migration of MCF-7 cells, elevate intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS) level, and decrease mitochondrial membrane potential. Western blot analysis showed that compound 6t upregulated Bax, cleaved caspase-3/9, cleaved PARP levels and downregulated Bcl-2 level of MCF-7 cells. All these results indicated that compound 6t could significantly induce the apoptosis of MCF-7 cells. Meanwhile, compound 6t markedly decreased p-AKT and p-mTOR expression, which revealed that compound 6t probably exerted its cytotoxicity through targeting PI3K/AKT/mTOR signaling pathway. Therefore, compound 6t could be a promising lead for the discovery of novel anticancer agents.

Evaluation of ursolic acid derivatives with potential anti-Toxoplasma gondii activity

Toxoplasma gondii is an important pathogen that causes serious public health problems. Currently, therapeutic drugs for toxoplasmosis cause serious side effects, and more effective and novel substances with relatively low toxicity are urgently needed. Ursolic acid (UA) has many properties that can be beneficial to healthcare. In this study, we synthesized eight series of UA derivatives bearing a tetrazole moiety and evaluated their anti-T. gondii activity in vitro using spiramycin as a positive control. Most of the synthesized derivatives exhibited better anti-T. gondii activity in vitro than UA, among which compound 12a exhibited the most potent anti-T. gondii activity. Furthermore, the results of biochemical parameter determination indicated that 12a effectively restored the normal body weight of mice infected with T. gondii, reduced hepatotoxicity, and exerted significant anti-oxidative effects compared with the findings for spiramycin. Additionally, our molecular docking study indicated that the synthesized compounds could act as potential inhibitors of T. gondii calcium-dependent protein kinase 1 (TgCDPK1), with 12a possessing strong affinity for TgCDPK1 via binding to the key amino acids GLU129 and TYR131.

Ursolic Acid-Based Derivatives as Potential Anti-Cancer Agents: An Update

Ursolic acid is a pharmacologically active pentacyclic triterpenoid derived from medicinal plants, fruit, and vegetables. The pharmacological activities of ursolic acid have been extensively studied over the past few years and various reports have revealed that ursolic acid has multiple biological activities, which include anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, anti-cancer, etc. In terms of cancer treatment, ursolic acid interacts with a number of molecular targets that play an essential role in many cell signaling pathways. It suppresses transformation, inhibits proliferation, and induces apoptosis of tumor cells. Although ursolic acid has many benefits, its therapeutic applications in clinical medicine are limited by its poor bioavailability and absorption. To overcome such disadvantages, researchers around the globe have designed and developed synthetic ursolic acid derivatives with enhanced therapeutic effects by structurally modifying the parent skeleton of ursolic acid. These structurally modified compounds display enhanced therapeutic effects when compared to ursolic acid. This present review summarizes various synthesized derivatives of ursolic acid with anti-cancer activity which were reported from 2015 to date.

Novel piperazine-tailored ursolic acid hybrids as significant antibacterial agents targeting phytopathogens Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae and X. axonopodis pv. citri probably directed by activation of apoptosis

BACKGROUND

Induced apoptosis is an effective technique that can reprogram cellular physiological and pathological processes to eradicate undesirable cells using their innate systems. Inspired by this, numerous apoptosis inducers have been developed to treat animal diseases, especially in the anticancer field. However, few studies have reported on the development of inductive agents that attack plant pathogens by activation of apoptosis. With the aim of exploring and discovering apoptosis inducers that target phytopathogens, a cluster of piperazine-tailored ursolic acid (UA) hybrids was systematically fabricated.

RESULTS

In vitro testing showed that the title molecules could inhibit the growth of two intractable bacterial strains, defined as Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae and X. axonopodis pv. citri. The corresponding lowest EC50 values were 0.37 and 1.08 μg mL-1 , which exceed those of UA (>400 μg mL-1 ) and positive controls. Moreover, compounds 5u and 5v could manage bacterial blight in vivo using pot experiments. Flow cytometer analysis indicted that the title compounds could induce distinct apoptotic behaviors on tested bacteria. In-depth study revealed that the introduction of designed compounds could reduce the enzyme activities of catalase and superoxide dismutase, subsequently leading to the accumulation of reactive oxygen species.

CONCLUSION

This study promoted the development of apoptosis initiators for managing bacterial infections in agriculture by an innovative mode of action. © 2020 Society of Chemical Industry.

Synthesis of cytotoxic urs-12-ene- and 28-norurs-12-ene- type conjugates with amino- and mercapto-1,3,4-oxadiazoles and mercapto-1,2,4-triazoles

A small library of 2-mercapto-1,3,4-oxadiazoles, 2-amino-1,3,4-oxadiazoles, and 3-mercapto-1,2,4-triazoles attached to the urs-12-ene- and 28-nor-urs-12-ene skeleton has been obtained. Ursolic acid derived hydrazides have been identified as useful starting materials for the developed synthesis. Ursolic acid hydrazide provided access to oxadiazoles attached directly to C-17 of the ursane core, but synthesis of structurally related 3-mercapto-1,2,4-triazoles was not possible in this way due to steric hindrance of the triterpenoid. Ester- and amide-linked hydrazides arising from ethoxycarbonylmethyl ursolate and ursolic acid amide with methyl β-alaninate served as key starting materials for the remotely connected mercapto-and amino-azoles. Antioxidant activities (DPPH method) of the newly obtained compounds are mediocre. However, excellent cytotoxicity and selectivity against MCF7 cell line were found for 28-nor-urs-12-ene 2-amino-1,3,4-oxadiazole conjugate. Also some other library members exceeded the cytotoxicity values of natural ursolic acid. The novel hybrid heterocycles with amino and mercapto substituents possess a great potential for further derivatization and are prospective scaffolds for the synthesis of triterpenoid analogs with chemopreventive and cytotoxic properties.

The Mediterranean Diet, a Rich Source of Angiopreventive Compounds in Cancer

Diet-based chemoprevention of cancer has emerged as an interesting approach to evade the disease or even target its early phases, reducing its incidence or slowing down tumor progression. In its basis in the essential role of angiogenesis for tumor growth and metastasis, angioprevention proposes the use of inhibitors of angiogenesis in cancer prevention. The anti-angiogenic potential exhibited by many natural compounds contained in many Mediterranean diet constituents makes this dietary pattern especially interesting as a source of chemopreventive agents, defined within the angioprevention strategy. In this review, we focus on natural bioactive compounds derived from the main foods included in the Mediterranean diet that display anti-angiogenic activity, as well as their possible use as angiopreventive agents.

Prospect of natural products in glioma: A novel avenue in glioma management

Glioma is one of the most perplexing cancers because of its infiltrating nature, molecular signaling, and location in central nervous system. Blood-brain barrier acts as a natural barrier to the glioma making it difficult to access by conventional chemotherapy. Clinicians are using natural compounds or their derivatives for several diseases including different cancers. However, the feasibility of using natural compounds in glioma is not explored in details. Natural compounds can act over a wide variety of signaling pathways such as survival and metabolic pathways and induce cell death. Some of the natural agents have additional benefits of crossing biological barriers such as blood-brain barrier with ease having few or no impact on the surrounding healthy cells. All of these benefits make natural compounds a prospective candidate for the glioma management. This article evaluates the benefits of using natural compounds for glioma therapy and their possible mechanism of actions. We have discussed the natural compounds assessed currently for glioma therapy and proposed a few novel natural compounds with potential antiglioma effect based on their mechanism of action.

Synthesis and evaluation of the HIF-1α inhibitory activities of novel ursolic acid tetrazole derivatives

The hypoxia-inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α) pathway has been implicated in tumor angiogenesis, growth, and metastasis. Therefore, the inhibition of this pathway is an important therapeutic target for the treatment of various types of cancers. Here, we designed and synthesized 31 ursolic acid (UA) derivatives containing a tetrazole moiety and evaluated them for their potential anti-tumor activities as HIF-1α transcriptional inhibitors. Of these, compound 14d (IC50 0.8 ± 0.2 µM) displayed the most potent activity and compounds 14a (IC50 4.7 ± 0.2 µM) exhibited the most promising biological profile. Analysis of the structure-activity relationships of these compounds with HIF-1α suggested that the presence of a tetrazole group located at C-28 of the UA derivatives was critical for their inhibitory activities.

Construction and biological evaluation of different self-assembled nanoarchitectures of FZU-03,010

Chemotherapy is currently one of the promising therapeutic methods for non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), but the emergence of multidrug resistance (MDR) is the greatest obstacle to efficient drug delivery for successful chemotherapy. Nanotechnology-based drug delivery holds great promise to promote intracellular drug delivery to reverse MDR. In this work, we used our previously synthesized ursolic acid (UA) derivative, FZU-03,010 (F3), to prepare nanodrugs of F3 with different architectures and study the role of the structure on the physiochemical properties and the biological effects against A549 and its PTX-resistant A549/PTX lung cancer cells. Using different preparation methods, amphiphilic F3 could self-assemble into different structures such as nanoaggregates (F3-NA), vesicles (F3-VC), or nanoparticles (F3-NP) with different physiochemical properties. The self-assembled nanodrugs could be utilized for the entrapment of fluorophores and showed different cellular uptake efficiencies. The cytotoxicity results demonstrated that compared with UA, F3-NA and F3-NP could suppress A549 and A549/PTX cells viability more potently at lower concentration. In addition, F3-NA and F3-NP could induce G1 cell cycle arrest, cell apoptosis and caspase-3 activation more efficiently than that of UA. Furthermore, F3-NA and F3-NP could effectively inhibit PI3K/Akt pathway and decrease the expression of Bcl-2 and the cell cycle-dependent kinase inhibitors p-ERK1/2 and Cyclin D1 in both A549 and A549/PTX cells. In conclusion, our results suggest that the UA derivative F3 is more potent in inhibiting cancer cell proliferation, and F3-NA and F3-NP have the potential to be developed as a therapeutic agent for resistant NSCLC cells.

Design, synthesis, evaluation, and molecular docking of ursolic acid derivatives containing a nitrogen heterocycle as anti-inflammatory agents

Ursolic acid derivatives containing oxadiazole, triazolone, and piperazine moieties were synthesized in an attempt to develop potent anti-inflammatory agents. Structures of the synthesized compounds were elucidated by 1H NMR, 13C NMR, and HRMS. Most of the synthesized compounds showed pronounced anti-inflammatory effects at 100 mg/kg. In particular, compound 11b, which displayed the most potent anti-inflammatory activity of all of the compounds prepared, with 69.76% inhibition after intraperitoneal administration, was more potent than the reference drugs indomethacin and ibuprofen. The cytotoxicity of the compounds was also assessed by the 3-(4,5-dimethyl-2-thiazolyl)-2,5-diphenyl-2-H-tetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay, and no compounds showed any appreciable cytotoxic activity (IC50 >100 μmol/L). Furthermore, molecular docking studies of the synthesized compounds were performed to rationalize the obtained biological results. Overall, the results indicate that compound 11b could be a therapeutic candidate for the treatment of inflammation.

Two novel Mg(II)-based and Zn(II)-based complexes: inhibiting growth of human liver cancer cells

Two new Mg(II)-based and Zn(II)-based coordination polymers, {[Mg3(BTB)(DMA)4](DMA)2}n (1, H3BTB=1,3,5-benzenetrisbenzoic acid, DMA=N,N-dimethylacetamide) and {(H2NMe2)2[Zn3(BTB)2(OH)(Im)](DMF)9(MeOH)7}n (2, Im=imidazole, DMF=N,N-dimethylformamide), have been successfully synthesized and structurally characterized under solvothermal conditions. 1 contains a linear [Mg3(COO)6] cluster that connected by the fully deprotonated BTB3- ligands to give a kgd-type 2D bilayer structure; 2 represents a microporous 3D pillar-layered system based on the binuclear Zn units and pillared Im ligands, which shows a (3,5)-connected hms topological net. In addition, in vitro anticancer activities of compounds 1 and 2 on 4 human liver cancer cells (HB611, HHCC, BEL-7405 and SMMC-7721) were determined.