N′-((2-(6-bromo-2-oxo-2H-chromen-3-yl)-1H-indol-3-yl)methylene)benzohydrazide as a probable Bcl-2/Bcl-xL inhibitor with apoptotic and anti-metastatic potential

Synthesis and characterization of 7-diethylamino-4-Chloromethyl coumarin: Spectroscopic analysis, molecular docking, and anticancer activity on large intestine carcinoma cells

Cancer, characterized by uncontrolled cell growth and metastasis, poses a significant global health burden, ranking as a leading cause of mortality worldwide. Colorectal cancer (CRC) specifically accounts for a substantial portion of cancer cases, with increasing incidence projected over the coming decades. While conventional treatments exist, they often entail adverse effects and limited efficacy, driving interest in natural remedies like coumarin derivatives due to their diverse biological activities and perceived safety profile. This study focuses on the synthesis and characterization of a novel compound, 7-diethylamino-4-chloromethyl coumarin (referred to as 7D4C), derived from coumarin. Structural elucidation employed Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), proton and carbon-13 nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (1H and 13C NMR), and mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF-MS). Molecular docking studies were conducted to explore potential biological interactions. Furthermore, the anti-cancer potential of 7D4C was assessed using human epithelial adenocarcinom (LoVo) and healthy fibroblast (CCD-18Co) cell lines. Viability analysis, comet assay for DNA damage, and evaluation of cancer biomarkers including apoptosis, intracellular reactive oxygen species (iROS) levels, mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP), intracellular glutathione (GSH) concentration, and intracellular calcium (iCa2+) levels were performed. The synthesis of 7D4C was successfully completed, and its structure was confirmed. Molecular docking results indicate that 7D4C exhibits strong binding affinity to the p53 protein, highlighting its potential as a novel modulator of p53 activity. Subsequent investigations revealed that the synthesized compound induced apoptosis in cancer cells by reducing MMP and triggering DNA damage through the production of iROS. The promising anti-cancer activity of 7D4C in the LoVo cell line highlights its importance in coumarin-based therapies. Introducing 7D4C could significantly enhance future research in this area, leveraging insights from in vitro coumarin studies.

Coumarin as an Elite Scaffold in Anti-Breast Cancer Drug Development: Design Strategies, Mechanistic Insights, and Structure-Activity Relationships

Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women. Currently, it poses a significant threat to the healthcare system due to the emerging resistance and toxicity of available drug candidates in clinical practice, thus generating an urgent need for the development of new potent and safer anti-breast cancer drug candidates. Coumarin (chromone-2-one) is an elite ring system widely distributed among natural products and possesses a broad range of pharmacological properties. The unique distribution and pharmacological efficacy of coumarins attract natural product hunters, resulting in the identification of numerous natural coumarins from different natural sources in the last three decades, especially those with anti-breast cancer properties. Inspired by this, numerous synthetic derivatives based on coumarins have been developed by medicinal chemists all around the globe, showing promising anti-breast cancer efficacy. This review is primarily focused on the development of coumarin-inspired anti-breast cancer agents in the last three decades, especially highlighting design strategies, mechanistic insights, and their structure-activity relationship. Natural coumarins having anti-breast cancer efficacy are also briefly highlighted. This review will act as a guideline for researchers and medicinal chemists in designing optimum coumarin-based potent and safer anti-breast cancer agents.

Latest developments in coumarin-based anticancer agents: mechanism of action and structure-activity relationship studies

Many researchers around the world are working on the development of novel anticancer drugs with different mechanisms of action. In this case, coumarin is a highly promising pharmacophore for the development of novel anticancer drugs. Besides, the hybridization of this moiety with other anticancer pharmacophores has emerged as a potent breakthrough in the treatment of cancer to decrease its side effects and increase its efficiency. This review aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the recent development of coumarin derivatives and their application as novel anticancer drugs. Herein, we highlight and describe the largest number of research works reported in this field from 2015 to August 2023, along with their mechanisms of action and structure-activity relationship studies, making this review different from the other review articles published on this topic to date.

Usnic acid as potential inhibitors of BCL2 and P13K protein through network pharmacology-based analysis, molecular docking and molecular dynamic simulation

Usnic acid (UA) lately piqued the interest of researchers for its extraordinary biological characteristics, including anticancer activity. Here, the mechanism was clarified through network pharmacology,molecular docking and molecular dynamic simulation. Sixteen proteins were selected through network pharmacology study as they are probable to interact with UA. Out of these proteins, 13 were filtered from PPI network analysis based on their significance of interactions (p < 0.05). KEGG pathway analysis has also aided us in determining the three most significant protein targets for UA, which are BCL2, PI3KCA and PI3KCG. Therefore molecular docking and molecular dynamic (MD) simulations throughout 100 ns were performed for usnic acid onto the three proteins mentioned. However, UA's docking score in all proteins is lower than their co-crystalised ligand, especially for BCL2 (-36.5158 kcal/mol) and PI3KCA (-44.5995 kcal/mol) proteins. The only exception is PI3KCG which has comparable results with the co-crystallised ligand with (-41.9351 kcal/mol). Furthermore, MD simulation has also revealed that usnic acid does not stay fit in the protein throughout the simulation trajectory for PI3KCA protein evident from RMSF and RMSD plots. Nevertheless, it still poses good ability in inhibiting BCL2 and PI3KCG protein in MD simulation. In the end, usnic acid has exhibited good potential in the inhibition of PI3KCG proteins, rather than the other proteins mentioned. Thus further study on structural modification of usnic acid could enhance the ability of usnic acid in the inhibition of PI3KCG as anti-colorectal and anti-small cell lung cancer drug candidate.Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma.

Selectivity mechanism of BCL-XL/2 inhibition through in silico investigation

BCL-XL protein is among the most important members of the anti-apoptotic subfamily of BCL-2 protein family, as currently a promising new target for anti-tumor drug research, even though BCL-XL/2 proteins...

Computer-Aided Drug Design Applied to Secondary Metabolites as Anticancer Agents

Computer-Aided Drug Design (CADD) techniques have garnered a great deal of attention in academia and industry because of their great versatility, low costs, possibilities of cost reduction in in vitro screening and in the development of synthetic steps; these techniques are compared with highthroughput screening, in particular for candidate drugs. The secondary metabolism of plants and other organisms provide substantial amounts of new chemical structures, many of which have numerous biological and pharmacological properties for virtually every existing disease, including cancer. In oncology, compounds such as vimblastine, vincristine, taxol, podophyllotoxin, captothecin and cytarabine are examples of how important natural products enhance the cancer-fighting therapeutic arsenal. In this context, this review presents an update of Ligand-Based Drug Design and Structure-Based Drug Design techniques applied to flavonoids, alkaloids and coumarins in the search of new compounds or fragments that can be used in oncology. A systematical search using various databases was performed. The search was limited to articles published in the last 10 years. The great diversity of chemical structures (coumarin, flavonoids and alkaloids) with cancer properties, associated with infinite synthetic possibilities for obtaining analogous compounds, creates a huge chemical environment with potential to be explored, and creates a major difficulty, for screening studies to select compounds with more promising activity for a selected target. CADD techniques appear to be the least expensive and most efficient alternatives to perform virtual screening studies, aiming to selected compounds with better activity profiles and better "drugability".

Targeting Bcl-2 for cancer therapy

Apoptosis deficiency is one of the most important features observed in neoplastic diseases. The Bcl-2 family is composed of a subset of proteins that act as decisive apoptosis regulators. Research and clinical studies have both demonstrated that the hyperactivation of Bcl-2-related anti-apoptotic effects correlates with cancer occurrence, progression and prognosis, also having a role in facilitating the radio- and chemoresistance of various malignancies. Therefore, targeting Bcl-2 inactivation has provided some compelling therapeutic advantages by enhancing apoptotic sensitivity or reversing drug resistance. Therefore, this pharmacological route turned into one of the most promising routes for cancer treatment. This review discusses some of the well-defined and emerging roles of Bcl-2 as well as its potential clinical value in cancer therapeutics.

Spectroscopic characterization, DFT studies, molecular docking and cytotoxic evaluation of 4-nitro-indole-3-carboxaldehyde: A potent lung cancer agent

The 4-nitro-1H-indole-carboxaldehyde (NICA) molecule was characterized experimentally using FT-IR, FT-Raman and UV-Vis spectra, and it was studied theoretically using DFT calculations. The optimized structure of the NICA molecule was determined by DFT calculations using B3LYP functional with cc-pVTZ basis set. The electron localization function (ELF) and local orbital localizer (LOL) studies were performed to visualize the electron delocalization in the molecule. The experimental and theoretical wavenumbers of the title molecule were assigned using VEDA 4.0 program. The charge delocalization and stability of the title molecule were investigated using natural bond orbital (NBO) analysis. Frontier molecular orbitals (FMOs) and related molecular properties were calculated. UV-Vis spectrum was calculated theoretically and validated experimentally. The reactive sites of the molecule were studied from the MEP surface and Fukui function analysis. The molecular docking analysis reveals that the NICA ligand shows better inhibitory activity against RAS, which causes lung cancer. The in vitro cytotoxic activity of the molecule against human lung cancer cell lines (A549) was determined by MTT assay. Thus, the NICA molecule can be used as a potential candidate for the development of the drug against lung cancer.

Single and dual target inhibitors based on Bcl-2: Promising anti-tumor agents for cancer therapy

B-cell lymphoma-2 (Bcl-2) proteins family is an essential checkpoint in apoptosis. Extensive evidences suggested that overexpression of anti-apoptotic Bcl-2 proteins can be observed in multiple cancer cell lines and primary tumor biopsy samples, which is an important reason for tumor cells to evade apoptosis and further acquire drug resistance for chemotherapy. Hence, down-regulation of anti-apoptotic Bcl-2 proteins is effective for the treatment of cancers. In view that Bcl-2 inhibitors and some other anti-tumor agents, such as HDAC inhibitors and Mdm2 inhibitors, exert synergy effects in tumor cells, it is pointed out that dual-targeting therapies based on these targets are regarded as rational strategies to enhance the effectiveness of single target agents for cancer treatment. This review briefly introduces the apoptosis, the structure of Bcl-2 family proteins, and focuses on the current status and recent advances of Bcl-2 inhibitors and the corresponding SARs of them. Moreover, we discuss the synergisms between Bcl-2 and other anti-tumor targets, and summarize the current dual-target agents.

Recent Development in Indole Derivatives as Anticancer Agents for Breast Cancer

BACKGROUND

Breast Cancer (BC) is the second most common cause of cancer related deaths in women. Due to severe side effects and multidrug resistance, current therapies like hormonal therapy, surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy become ineffective. Also, the existing drugs for BC treatment are associated with several drawbacks such as poor oral bioavailability, non-selectivity and poor pharmacodynamics properties. Therefore, there is an urgent need for the development of more effective and safer anti BC agents.

OBJECTIVE

This article explored in detail the possibilities of indole-based heterocyclic compounds as anticancer agents with breast cancer as their major target.

METHODS

Recent literature related to indole derivatives endowed with encouraging anti BC potential is reviewed. With special focus on BC, this review offers a detailed account of multiple mechanisms of action of various indole derivatives: aromatase inhibitor, tubulin inhibitor, microtubule inhibitor, targeting estrogen receptor, DNA-binding mechanism, induction of apoptosis, inhibition of PI3K/AkT/NFkB/mTOR, and HDAC inhibitors, by which these derivatives have shown promising anticancer potential.

RESULTS

Exhaustive literature survey indicated that indole derivatives are associated with properties of inducing apoptosis and disturbing tubulin assembly. Indoles are also associated with the inhibition of NFkB/mTOR/PI3K/AkT and regulation of estrogen-mediated activity. Furthermore, indole derivatives have been found to modulate critical targets such as topoisomerase and HDAC. These derivatives have shown significant activity against breast cancer cells.

CONCLUSION

In BC, indole derivatives seem to be quite competent and act through various mechanisms that are well established in case of BC. This review has shown that indole derivatives can further be explored for the betterment of BC chemotherapy. A lot of potential is still hidden which demands to be discovered for upgrading BC chemotherapy.

Synthesis, crystal structures, antiproliferative activities and reverse docking studies of eight novel Schiff bases derived from benzil

Eight novel Schiff bases derived from benzil dihydrazone (BDH) or benzil monohydrazone (BMH) and four fused-ring carbonyl compounds (3-formylindole, FI; 3-acetylindole, AI; 3-formyl-1-methylindole, MFI; 1-formylnaphthalene, FN) were synthesized and characterized by elemental analysis, ESI-QTOF-MS, ¹H and ¹³C NMR spectroscopy, as well as single-crystal X-ray diffraction. They are (1Z,2Z)-1,2-bis{(E)-[(1H-indol-3-yl)methylidene]hydrazinylidene}-1,2-diphenylethane (BDHFI), C₃₂H₂₄N₆, (1Z,2Z)-1,2-bis{(E)-[1-(1H-indol-3-yl)ethylidene]hydrazinylidene}-1,2-diphenylethane (BDHAI), C₃₄H₂₈N₆, (1Z,2Z)-1,2-bis{(E)-[(1-methyl-1H-indol-3-yl)methylidene]hydrazinylidene}-1,2-diphenylethane (BMHMFI) acetonitrile hemisolvate, C₃₄H₂₈N₆·0.5CH₃CN, (1Z,2Z)-1,2-bis{(E)-[(naphthalen-1-yl)methylidene]hydrazinylidene}-1,2-diphenylethane (BDHFN), C₃₆H₂₆N₄, (Z)-2-{(E)-[(1H-indol-3-yl)methylidene]hydrazinylidene}-1,2-diphenylethanone (BMHFI), C₂₃H₁₇N₃O, (Z)-2-{(E)-[1-(1H-indol-3-yl)ethylidene]hydrazinylidene}-1,2-diphenylethanone (BMHAI), C₂₄H₁₉N₃O, (Z)-2-{(E)-[(1-methyl-1H-indol-3-yl)methylidene]hydrazinylidene}-1,2-diphenylethanone (BMHMFI), C₂₄H₁₉N₃O, and (Z)-2-{(E)-[(naphthalen-1-yl)methylidene]hydrazinylidene}-1,2-diphenylethanone (BMHFN) C₂₅H₁₈N₂O. Moreover, the in vitro cytotoxicity of the eight title compounds was evaluated against two tumour cell lines (A549 human lung cancer and 4T₁ mouse breast cancer) and two normal cell lines (MRC-5 normal lung cells and NIH 3T3 fibroblasts) by MTT assay. The results indicate that four (BDHMFI, BDHFN, BMHMFI and BMHFN) are inactive and the other four (BDHFI, BDHAI, BMHFI and BMHAI) show severe toxicities against human A549 and mouse 4T₁ cells, similar to the standard cisplatin. All the compounds exhibited weaker cytotoxicity against normal cells than cancer cells. The Swiss Target Prediction web server was applied for the prediction of protein targets. After analyzing the differences in frequency hits between these active and inactive Schiff bases, 18 probable targets were selected for reverse docking with the Surflex-dock function in SYBYL-X 2.0 software. Three target proteins, i.e. human ether-á-go-go-related (hERG) potassium channel, the inhibitor of apoptosis protein 3 and serine/threonine-protein kinase PIM1, were chosen as the targets. Finally, the ligand-based structure-activity relationships were analyzed based on the putative protein target (hERG) docking results, which will be used to design and synthesize novel hERG ion channel inhibitors.

Recent Advances in Apoptosis: THE Role of Hydrazones

The process of programmed cell death in higher eukaryotes (apoptosis), is generally characterized by distinct morphological characteristics and energy-dependent biochemical mechanisms. Apoptosis is considered as a vital component of various processes including normal cell turnover, proper development and functioning of the immune system, hormone-dependent atrophy, embryonic development and chemical-induced cell death. Apoptosis seems to play an important key role in the progression of several human diseases like Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease and many types of cancer. Promotion of apoptosis may be a good approach for the prevention of cancer cell proliferation. In early studies, antitumor compounds have been found to induce the apoptotic process in tumor cells. On the other hand, several hydrazones were reported to have lower toxicity than hydrazides due to the blockage of -NH2 group. Therefore, the design of hydrazones that activate and promote apoptosis is an attractive strategy for the discovery and development of potential anticancer agents. The aim of this review is to provide a general overview of current knowledge and the connection between apoptosis and hydrazone. It is also the guide for the apoptotic activities of new hydrazone derivatives.

Coumarin-containing hybrids and their anticancer activities

Cancer is the second leading cause of death worldwide, and it results in around 9 million deaths annually. The anticancer agents play an intriguing role in the treatment of cancers, while the severe anticancer scenario and the emergence of drug-resistant especially multidrug-resistant cancers create a huge demand for novel anticancer drugs with different mechanisms of action. The coumarin scaffold is ubiquitous in nature and is a highly privileged motif for the development of novel drugs due to its biodiversity and versatility. Coumarin derivatives can exert diverse antiproliferative mechanisms, and some of them such as Irosustat are under clinical trials for the treatment of various cancers, revealing their potential as putative anticancer drugs. Hybridization of coumarin moiety with other anticancer pharmacophores is a promising strategy to reduce side effects, overcome the drug resistance, and may provide valuable therapeutic intervention for the treatment of cancers. Thus, coumarin-containing hybrids occupy an important position in the development of novel anticancer agents. This review aims to summarize the recent advances made towards the development of coumarin-containing hybrids as potential anticancer agents, covering articles published between 2015 and 2019, and the structure-activity relationship together with mechanisms of action are also discussed.

Rhodium(iii) complexes with isoquinoline derivatives as potential anticancer agents: in vitro and in vivo activity studies

Two rhodium complexes Rh1 and Rh2 with isoquinoline derivatives were synthesized and characterized.

1-(5-Bromo-2-hydroxy-4-methoxyphenyl)ethanone [SE1] Inhibits MMP-9 Expression by Regulating NF-κB and MAPKs Signaling Pathways in HT1080 Human Fibrosarcoma Cells

Hippocampus is a traditional medicine in China, which can be used for treating tumors, aging, fatigue, thrombosis, inflammation, hypertension, prostatic hyperplasia, and other diseases. 1-(5-Bromo-2-hydroxy-4-methoxyphenyl)ethanone [SE1] from seahorse (Hippocampus kuda Bleeler) has been shown to suppress proinflammatory responses. In the present study, SE1 potently inhibited gelatin digestion by MMP-9 induced by phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate (PMA) and migration of human fibrosarcoma HT1080 cells in dose-dependent manner. Moreover, western blot analysis and immunofluorescence analysis have been studied on MAPKs (ERK1/2, p38 kinase and JNK) and NF-κB (p65 and IκB), which refer to the clear molecular mechanism. The results indicated that SE1 significantly suppressed the phosphorylation of mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPK: p38 kinase and JNK) and NF-κB. Finally, molecular docking result showed SE1 interacts with TYR245 and HIS226 of MMP-9 by hydrogen bond and Pi-Pi bond to suppress MMP-9 activity. This data suggested that the SE1 may possess therapeutic and preventive potential for the treatment of MMP-9 related disorders.

Discovery of 5,6-diaryl-1,2,4-triazines hybrids as potential apoptosis inducers

A series of 5,6-diaryl-1,2,4-triazines hybrids bearing a 1,2,3-triazole linker were synthesized by molecular hybridization strategy and evaluated for antiproliferative activity against three selected cancer cell lines (MGC-803, EC-109 and PC-3). The first structure-activity relationship (SAR) for these 5,6-diaryl-1,2,4-triazines is explored in this report with evaluation of 15 variants of the structural class. Among these chemical derivatives, 3-(((1-(4-fluorobenzyl)-1H-1,2,3-triazol-4-yl)methyl)thio)-5,6-diphenyl-1,2,4-triazine (11E) showed the more potent inhibitory effect against three cell lines than 5-Fu. Cellular mechanism studies in MGC-803 cells elucidated 11E inhibited colony formation and arrested cell cycle at G2/M phase. Furthermore, compound 11E caused morphological changes, decreased mitochondrial membrane potential, and induced apoptosis through the apoptosis-related proteins in MGC-803 cells. It was the first time, to our knowledge, that 5,6-diaryl-1,2,4-triazines bearing a 1,2,3-triazole linker were used as potential apoptosis inducers.