"Click" reaction mediated synthesis of costunolide and dehydrocostuslactone derivatives and evaluation of their cytotoxic activity

Exploration of costunolide derivatives as potential anti-inflammatory agents for topical treatment of atopic dermatitis by inhibiting MAPK/NF-κB pathways

Atopic dermatitis (AD) is a common inflammatory disease and it is very difficult to treat. In the present work, a series of costunolide derivatives have been prepared, and in vitro and in vivo anti-inflammatory activities have evaluated. The results showed that most derivatives displayed good inhibition of NO generation with low cytotoxicity, and 7d could inhibit the phosphorylation of P38, P65 NF-κB and IκB-α in LPS-induced RAW264.7 model. The in vivo researches showed that 7d could improve skin injury symptoms, decrease Th2-type cytokine levels, inhibit HIS levels, alleviate scratching and repaire the damaged skin barrier through the inhibition of phosphorylation of MAPK and NF-κB signaling pathways on MC903-induced AD model. Therefore, costunolide derivatives may be new potent anti-AD agents for further study.

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.

Modification of Sesquiterpene Lactones—Dehydrocostus Lactone and Alantolactone—by Click Chemistry Method. Cytotoxic Activity of the Obtained Conjugates

Abstract

A method for modifying sesquiterpene lactones using the click chemistry methodology has been developed. A series of conjugates of alantolactone and dehydrocostus lactone with alkoxy substituted benzylazides was obtained and their cytotoxic profile with respect to tumor cells of the A549, SH-SY5Y, Hep-2 and HeLa lines was evaluated. It has been shown that derivatives containing dehydrocostus lactone motif in their structure exhibit the highest cytotoxic activity.

Application of triazoles in the structural modification of natural products

Nature products have been extensively used in the discovery and development of new drugs, as the most important source of drugs. The triazole ring is one of main pharmacophore of the nitrogen-containing heterocycles. Thus, a new class of triazole-containing natural product conjugates has been synthesised. These compounds reportedly exert anticancer, anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, antiparasitic, antiviral, antioxidant, anti-Alzheimer, and enzyme inhibitory effects. This review summarises the research progress of triazole-containing natural product derivatives involved in medicinal chemistry in the past six years. This review provides insights and perspectives that will help scientists in the fields of organic synthesis, medicinal chemistry, phytochemistry, and pharmacology.

Click Chemistry in Natural Product Modification

Click chemistry is perhaps the most powerful synthetic toolbox that can efficiently access the molecular diversity and unique functions of complex natural products up to now. It enables the ready synthesis of diverse sets of natural product derivatives either for the optimization of their drawbacks or for the construction of natural product-like drug screening libraries. This paper showcases the state-of-the-art development of click chemistry in natural product modification and summarizes the pharmacological activities of the active derivatives as well as the mechanism of action. The aim of this paper is to gain a deep understanding of the fruitful achievements and to provide perspectives, trends, and directions regarding further research in natural product medicinal chemistry.

Natural Products Containing Olefinic Bond: Important Substrates for Semi-synthetic Modification Towards Value Addition

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Semi-synthesis, the way of preparing novel bioactive molecules via modification of compounds isolated from natural sources is very much useful nowadays in the drug discovery process. The modification is based on the reaction of functional group(s) present in a natural compound. Among the examples of functional group transformation, double bond modification is also common in the literature. Several reactions like hydrogenation, cyclopropanation, epoxidation, addition reaction (halogenations, hydroxylation), Michael addition, Heck reaction, cycloaddition, dipolar cycloaddition, etc. are employed for this purpose. In this review, we have tried to gather the reactions performed with several double bond containing classes of natural products like diterpenes, xanthones, sesquiterpene exomethylene lactones, diaryl heptanoids, steroidal lactones, triterpenoids, limonoids, and alkamides. Where available, the effects of transformations on the biological activities of the molecules are also mentioned.

Applications of Sesquiterpene Lactones: A Review of Some Potential Success Cases

Sesquiterpene lactones, a vast range of terpenoids isolated from Asteraceae species, exhibit a broad spectrum of biological effects and several of them are already commercially available, such as artemisinin. Here the most recent and impactful results of in vivo, preclinical and clinical studies involving a selection of ten sesquiterpene lactones (alantolactone, arglabin, costunolide, cynaropicrin, helenalin, inuviscolide, lactucin, parthenolide, thapsigargin and tomentosin) are presented and discussed, along with some of their derivatives. In the authors’ opinion, these compounds have been neglected compared to others, although they could be of great use in developing important new pharmaceutical products. The selected sesquiterpenes show promising anticancer and anti-inflammatory effects, acting on various targets. Moreover, they exhibit antifungal, anxiolytic, analgesic, and antitrypanosomal activities. Several studies discussed here clearly show the potential that some of them have in combination therapy, as sensitizing agents to facilitate and enhance the action of drugs in clinical use. The derivatives show greater pharmacological value since they have better pharmacokinetics, stability, potency, and/or selectivity. All these natural terpenoids and their derivatives exhibit properties that invite further research by the scientific community.

Antitumor activity and mechanism of costunolide and dehydrocostus lactone: Two natural sesquiterpene lactones from the Asteraceae family

Costunolide (COS) and dehydrocostus lactone (DEH) are two natural sesquiterpene lactones with potential antitcancer activity against a range of cancer cell types both in vitro and in vivo, particularly for breast cancer and leukemia. There are many researches that have been taken to characterize these pathways and to reveal their anticancer mechanisms of action of COS and DEH. However, while there is a great deal of evidence detailing the effects of COS and DEH on considerable signaling pathways and cellular functions, a global view of their mechanism of action remains elusive. This review systematically summarizes the antitumor activity and mechanism of COS and DEH in the recent reports, and discusses the effect of the key active part (α-methylene-γ-butyrolactone) of COS and DEH against cancer. Moreover, we also discuss the antineoplastic activity of COS and DEH derivatives to improve the cytotoxicity and safety index. We believe this review can provide a systemic reference to develop COS and DEH as anticancer agents.

1,2,3-Triazole-containing hybrids as potential anticancer agents: Current developments, action mechanisms and structure-activity relationships

Anticancer agents are critical for the cancer treatment, but side effects and the drug resistance associated with the currently used anticancer agents create an urgent need to explore novel drugs with low side effects and high efficacy. 1,2,3-Triazole is privileged building block in the discovery of new anticancer agents, and some of its derivatives have already been applied in clinics or under clinical trials for fighting against cancers. Hybrid molecules occupy an important position in cancer control, and hybridization of 1,2,3-triazole framework with other anticancer pharmacophores may provide valuable therapeutic intervention for the treatment of cancer, especially drug-resistant cancer. This review emphasizes the recent advances in 1,2,3-triazole-containing hybrids with anticancer potential, covering articles published between 2015 and 2019, and the structure-activity relationships, together with mechanisms of action are also discussed.

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.