Kinase selectivity profiling by inhibitor affinity chromatography

As new drugs rapidly advance into clinical trials, comprehensive identification of their intracellular targets becomes fundamental for the full understanding of the molecular basis of their efficacy and toxicity. This is particularly important when the targets belong to a large family and the inhibitors recognize a conserved site among different members of the class. A typical example is the kinase family, where efforts are aimed at the development of inhibitors of distinct kinases for therapeutic applications in oncology, inflammation and other disease areas. In this case, inhibitors targeting the ATP pocket may cross react with different kinases, as well as with other proteins that bind ATP. This review critically discusses the available approaches for kinase selectivity profiling. It also reviews some examples of inhibitor affinity chromatography applied to inhibitors of kinases and other protein families as a tool to identify and characterize their intracellular targets.     

Kinase selectivity profiling by inhibitor affinity chromatography

As new drugs rapidly advance into clinical trials, comprehensive identification of their intracellular targets becomes fundamental for the full understanding of the molecular basis of their efficacy and toxicity. This is particularly important when the targets belong to a large family and the inhibitors recognize a conserved site among different members of the class. A typical example is the kinase family, where efforts are aimed at the development of inhibitors of distinct kinases for therapeutic applications in oncology, inflammation and other disease areas. In this case, inhibitors targeting the ATP pocket may cross react with different kinases, as well as with other proteins that bind ATP. This review critically discusses the available approaches for kinase selectivity profiling. It also reviews some examples of inhibitor affinity chromatography applied to inhibitors of kinases and other protein families as a tool to identify and characterize their intracellular targets.     

Skepinone-L is a selective p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase inhibitor

Until now, a lack of inhibitors with high potency and selectivity in vivo has hampered investigation of the p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) signaling pathway. We describe the design of skepinone-L, which is, to our knowledge, the first ATP-competitive p38 MAPK inhibitor with excellent in vivo efficacy and selectivity. Therefore, skepinone-L is a valuable probe for chemical biology research, and it may foster the development of a unique class of kinase inhibitors.     

High affinity targets of protein kinase inhibitors have similar residues at the positions energetically important for binding

Inhibition of protein kinase activity is a focus of intense drug discovery efforts in several therapeutic areas. Major challenges facing the field include understanding of the factors determining the selectivity of kinase inhibitors and the development of compounds with the desired selectivity profile. Here, we report the analysis of sequence variability among high and low affinity targets of eight different small molecule kinase inhibitors (BIRB796, Tarceva, NU6102, Gleevec, SB203580, balanol, H89, PP1). It is observed that all high affinity targets of each inhibitor are found among a relatively small number of kinases, which have similar residues at the specific positions important for binding. The findings are highly statistically significant, and allow one to exclude the majority of kinases in a genome from a list of likely targets for an inhibitor. The findings have implications for the design of novel inhibitors with a desired selectivity profile (e.g. targeted at multiple kinases), the discovery of new targets for kinase inhibitor drugs, comparative analysis of different in vivo models, and the design of "a-la-carte" chemical libraries tailored for individual kinases.     

Synthesis and evaluation of heteroaryl substituted diazaspirocycles as scaffolds to probe the ATP-binding site of protein kinases

With the success of protein kinase inhibitors as drugs to target cancer, there is a continued need for new kinase inhibitor scaffolds. We have investigated the synthesis and kinase inhibition of new heteroaryl-substituted diazaspirocyclic compounds that mimic ATP. Versatile syntheses of substituted diazaspirocycles through ring-closing metathesis were demonstrated. Diazaspirocycles directly linked to heteroaromatic hinge binder groups provided ligand efficient inhibitors of multiple kinases, suitable as starting points for further optimization. The binding modes of representative diazaspirocyclic motifs were confirmed by protein crystallography. Selectivity profiles were influenced by the hinge binder group and the interactions of basic nitrogen atoms in the scaffold with acidic side-chains of residues in the ATP pocket. The introduction of more complex substitution to the diazaspirocycles increased potency and varied the selectivity profiles of these initial hits through engagement of the P-loop and changes to the spirocycle conformation, demonstrating the potential of these core scaffolds for future application to kinase inhibitor discovery.     

Activation loop targeting strategy for design of receptor-interacting protein kinase 2 (RIPK2) inhibitors

Development of selective kinase inhibitors remains a challenge due to considerable amino acid sequence similarity among family members particularly in the ATP binding site. Targeting the activation loop might offer improved inhibitor selectivity since this region of kinases is less conserved. However, the strategy presents difficulties due to activation loop flexibility. Herein, we report the design of receptor-interacting protein kinase 2 (RIPK2) inhibitors based on pan-kinase inhibitor regorafenib that aim to engage basic activation loop residues Lys169 or Arg171. We report development of CSR35 that displayed >10-fold selective inhibition of RIPK2 versus VEGFR2, the target of regorafenib. A co-crystal structure of CSR35 with RIPK2 revealed a resolved activation loop with an ionic interaction between the carboxylic acid installed in the inhibitor and the side-chain of Lys169. Our data provides principle feasibility of developing activation loop targeting type II inhibitors as a complementary strategy for achieving improved selectivity.     

Advances in the structural biology, design and clinical development of VEGF-R kinase inhibitors for the treatment of angiogenesis

Initial studies with angiogenesis inhibitors showed little clinical benefit. However, recently reported clinical studies in colorectal cancer have shown that bevacizumab, a vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) monoclonal antibody, in combination with cytotoxic therapy has positive effects on patient survival. Furthermore, the VEGF receptor kinase (VEGF-R) tyrosine kinase inhibitor, vatalanib, has also shown encouraging results in colorectal cancer, with molecular resonance imaging providing evidence that the anti-tumor efficacy was indeed the result of anti-angiogenic activity. Both of these agents are progressing in phase III trials. This proof of concept has stimulated the desire for second-generation VEGF-R inhibitors having an improved profile. Structural biology insight regarding the binding mode of protein kinase inhibitors is valuable for the design of molecules possessing superior selectivity, efficacy and tolerability. Towards this goal, we have developed a new series of VEGF-R2 kinase inhibitors, based upon an anthranilic acid amide scaffold. An X-ray crystal structure of a representative compound, AAL993 (ZK260253), in complex with the catalytic domain of diphosphorylated VEGF-R2 has revealed that this molecule binds to an inactive conformation of the protein. This binding mode, similar to that observed for the anti-leukemia drug, imatinib in complex with c-Abl kinase, may be responsible for the high selectivity of AAL993 and provides valuable insight for the design of further compounds.     

Protein structure: discovering selective protein kinase inhibitors

A plethora of important targets for therapeutic intervention occurs in the protein kinase superfamily, one of the most thoroughly investigated groups of drug targets. Kinases have a deep hydrophobic ATP binding site that has been successfully exploited with the discovery of potent ATP-competitive drugs. However, most features of this pocket are well conserved in all protein kinases, which explains why kinase inhibitors typically exhibit a fairly indiscriminate spectrum of activity. Crystal structures of various protein kinases bound to their ligands are described, which begin to explain the observed selectivity profiles of kinase inhibitors. The insights gained from these structures suggest several approaches to improve inhibitor specificity and these approaches are summarized. The exciting potential of new high-throughput methods in structure determination that enable the systematic atomic-resolution investigation of large numbers of inhibitors bound to their various kinase targets will be discussed.     

Structure-based design of P3 moieties in the peptide mimetic factor VIIa inhibitor

Selective factor VIIa-tissue factor complex (FVIIa/TF) inhibition is seen as a promising target for developing new anticoagulant drugs. Structure-based designs of the P3 moiety in the peptide mimetic factor VIIa inhibitor successfully lead to novel inhibitors with selectivity for FVIIa/TF and extrinsic coagulation the same as or even higher than those of previously reported peptide mimetic factor VIIa inhibitors. X-ray crystal structure analysis reveals that one of the novel inhibitors shows improved selectivity by forming interactions between the inhibitor and FVIIa as expected. Another of the novel inhibitors achieves improved selectivity through an unexpected hydrogen bond with Gln217, with a unique bent conformation in FVIIa/TF accompanied by conformational changes of the inhibitor and the protein.     

Structural basis for producing selective MAP2K7 inhibitors

Mitogen-activated protein kinase kinase 7 (MAP2K7) in the c-Jun N-terminal kinase signal cascade is an attractive drug target for a variety of diseases. The selectivity of MAP2K7 inhibitors against off-target kinases is a major barrier in drug development. We report a crystal structure of MAP2K7 complexed with a potent covalent inhibitor bearing an acrylamide moiety as an electrophile, which discloses a structural basis for producing selective and potent MAP2K7 inhibitors.     

Design, synthesis and characterization of "clickable" 4-anilinoquinazoline kinase inhibitors

Immobilized kinase inhibitors have emerged as powerful reagents for the determination of kinase inhibitor selectivity and for the enrichment of protein targets from cellular lysates. Here, we report the design and synthesis of a set of "clickable" 4-anilinoquinazoline kinase inhibitors. We demonstrate that the attachment of a flexible tether that contains a bio-orthogonal azide functionality does not adversely affect the potency or selectivity of these inhibitors. Furthermore, we demonstrate the utility of these inhibitors through the generation of an affinity matrix for the enrichment of interacting proteins from cellular lysates.     

A quantitative analysis of kinase inhibitor selectivity

Kinase inhibitors are a new class of therapeutics with a propensity to inhibit multiple targets. The biological consequences of multi-kinase activity are poorly defined, and an important step toward understanding the relationship between selectivity, efficacy and safety is the exploration of how inhibitors interact with the human kinome. We present interaction maps for 38 kinase inhibitors across a panel of 317 kinases representing >50% of the predicted human protein kinome. The data constitute the most comprehensive study of kinase inhibitor selectivity to date and reveal a wide diversity of interaction patterns. To enable a global analysis of the results, we introduce the concept of a selectivity score as a general tool to quantify and differentiate the observed interaction patterns. We further investigate the impact of panel size and find that small assay panels do not provide a robust measure of selectivity.     

Trisubstituted thiazoles as potent and selective inhibitors of Plasmodium falciparum protein kinase G (PfPKG)

A series of trisubstituted thiazoles have been identified as potent inhibitors of Plasmodium falciparum (Pf) cGMP-dependent protein kinase (PfPKG) through template hopping from known Eimeria PKG (EtPKG) inhibitors. The thiazole series has yielded compounds with improved potency, kinase selectivity and good in vitro ADME properties. These compounds could be useful tools in the development of new anti-malarial drugs in the fight against drug resistant malaria.     

Kinomics-structural biology and chemogenomics of kinase inhibitors and targets

Classifying kinases based entirely on small molecule selectivity data is a new approach to drug discovery that allows scientists to understand relationships between targets. This approach combines the understanding of small molecules and targets, and thereby assists the researcher in finding new targets for existing molecules or understanding selectivity and polypharmacology of molecules in related targets. Currently, structural information is available for relatively few of the protein kinases encoded in the human genome (7% of the estimated 518); however, even the current knowledge base, when paired with structure-based design techniques, can assist in the identification and optimization of novel kinase inhibitors across the entire protein class. Chemogenomics attempts to combine genomic data, structural biological data, classical dendrograms, and selectivity data to explore, define, and classify the medicinally relevant kinase space. Exploitation of this information in the discovery of kinase inhibitors defines practical kinase chemogenomics (kinomics). In this paper, we review the available information on kinase targets and their inhibitors, and present the relationships between the various classification schema for kinase space. In particular, we present the first dendrogram of kinases based entirely on small molecule selectivity data. We find that the selectivity dendrogram differs from sequence-based clustering mostly in the higher-level groupings of the smaller clusters, and remains very comparable for closely homologous targets. Highly homologous kinases are, on average, inhibited comparably by small molecules. This observation, although intuitive, is very important to the process of target selection, as one would expect difficulty in achieving inhibitor selectivity for kinases that share high sequence identity.     

Achieving selectivity between highly homologous tyrosine kinases: a novel selective erbB2 inhibitor

The discovery of small molecule kinase inhibitors for use as drugs is a promising approach for the treatment of cancer and other diseases, but the discovery of highly specific agents is challenging because over 850 kinases are expressed in mammalian cells. Systematic modification of the 4-anilino functionality of a selective quinazoline inhibitor of the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) tyrosine kinase can invert selectivity to favor inhibition of the highly homologous erbB2 tyrosine kinase. The selectivity pattern was demonstrated in assays of recombinant kinases and recapitulated in measures of kinase activity in intact cells. The most potent and selective erbB2 inhibitor of the analog series has anti-proliferative activity against an erbB2-overexpressing cell line that was lacking in the original EGFR-selective compound. Subtle changes to the molecular structure of ATP-competitive small molecule inhibitors of tyrosine kinases can yield dramatic changes in potency and selectivity. These results suggest that the discovery of highly selective small molecule inhibitors of very homologous kinases is achievable.     

Introducing a simple model system for binding studies of known and novel inhibitors of AMPK: a therapeutic target for prostate cancer

Prostate cancer (PC) is one of the leading cancers in men, raising a serious health issue worldwide. Due to lack of suitable biomarker, their inhibitors and the platform for testing those inhibitors result in poor prognosis of PC. AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) is a highly conserved protein kinase found in eukaryotes that is involved in growth and development, and also acts as a therapeutic target for PC. The aim of the present study is to identify novel potent inhibitors of AMPK and propose a simple cellular model system for understanding its biology. Structural modelling and MD simulations were performed to construct and refine the 3D models of Dictyostelium and human AMPK. Binding mechanisms of different drug compounds were studied by performing molecular docking, molecular dynamics and MM-PBSA methods. Two novel drugs were isolated having higher binding affinity over the known drugs and hydrophobic forces that played a key role during protein–ligand interactions. The study also explored the simple cellular model system for drug screening and understanding the biology of a therapeutic target by performing in vitro experiments.     

Structural analysis of the mechanism of inhibition and allosteric activation of the kinase domain of HER2 protein

Aberrant signaling of ErbB family members human epidermal growth factor 2 (HER2) and epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) is implicated in many human cancers, and HER2 expression is predictive of human disease recurrence and prognosis. Small molecule kinase inhibitors of EGFR and of both HER2 and EGFR have received approval for the treatment of cancer. We present the first high resolution crystal structure of the kinase domain of HER2 in complex with a selective inhibitor to understand protein activation, inhibition, and function at the molecular level. HER2 kinase domain crystallizes as a dimer and suggests evidence for an allosteric mechanism of activation comparable with previously reported activation mechanisms for EGFR and HER4. A unique Gly-rich region in HER2 following the α-helix C is responsible for increased conformational flexibility within the active site and could explain the low intrinsic catalytic activity previously reported for HER2. In addition, we solved the crystal structure of the kinase domain of EGFR in complex with a HER2/EGFR dual inhibitor (TAK-285). Comparison with previously reported inactive and active EGFR kinase domain structures gave insight into the mechanism of HER2 and EGFR inhibition and may help guide the design and development of new cancer drugs with improved potency and selectivity.     

Understanding the relative affinity and specificity of the substrate binding site of protein kinase B for substrate-mimetic inhibitors

Designing selective inhibitor of protein kinase B (PKB/Akt) is an area of intense research to develop potential anticancer drugs. As a general point of strategy, the peptide substrate-binding site only responds to a highly specific sequence of amino acids. Targeting the substrate-mimetic inhibitors to the peptide substrate-binding site has the potential for better selectivity. It is therefore of great interest to understand the peptide substrate binding mode of PKB, as well as its specificity and affinity for different substrate-mimetic inhibitors. In the present study, we used molecular dynamic simulations to better understand the interactions of the PKB substrate-binding site with the substrate-mimetic inhibitors. Our computational models successfully mirrored PKB’s selectivity for the substrate-mimetic inhibitors. Furthermore, the key residues interacting with the substrate-mimetic inhibitor were discussed by analysing the different interaction modes of these inhibitors, with different inhibitory potencies, binding to PKB and by comparing the different binding free energy contributions of corresponding residues around the binding pocket. The pharmacophoric requirements were then also summarised for the substrate-mimetic inhibitor binding to PKB. It is expected that this work will provide useful chemical or biochemical informatics for the design of novel and potent substrate-mimetic inhibitors of PKB.     

Inhibitors of the Abl kinase directed at either the ATP- or myristate-binding site

The ATP-competitive inhibitors dasatinib and nilotinib, which bind to catalytically different conformations of the Abl kinase domain, have recently been approved for the treatment of imatinib-resistant CML. These two new drugs, albeit very efficient against most of the imatinib-resistant mutants of Bcr–Abl, fail to effectively suppress the Bcr–Abl activity of the T315I (or gatekeeper) mutation. Generating new ATP site-binding drugs that target the T315I in Abl has been hampered, amongst others, by target selectivity, which is frequently an issue when developing ATP-competitive inhibitors. Recently, using an unbiased cellular screening approach, GNF-2, a non-ATP-competitive inhibitor, has been identified that demonstrates cellular activity against Bcr–Abl transformed cells. The exquisite selectivity of GNF-2 is due to the finding that it targets the myristate binding site located near the C-terminus of the Abl kinase domain, as demonstrated by genetic approaches, solution NMR and X-ray crystallography. GNF-2, like myristate, is able to induce and/or stabilize the clamped inactive conformation of Abl analogous to the SH2-Y527 interaction of Src. The molecular mechanism for allosteric inhibition by the GNF-2 inhibitor class, and the combined effects with ATP-competitive inhibitors such as nilotinib and imatinib on wild-type Abl and imatinib-resistant mutants, in particular the T315I gatekeeper mutant, are reviewed.     

Nilotinib based pharmacophore models for BCRABL

Tyrosine kinase inhibitors have revolutionized the treatment of several malignancies, converting lethal diseases in a manageable aspect. Imitanib, a small molecule ABL kinase inhibitor is a highly effective therapy for early phase chronic myeloid leukemia (CML), which has constitutively active ABL kinase activity owing to the over expression of the BCR-ABL fusion protein. But some patients develop imatinib resistance, particularly in the advanced phases of CML.The discovery of resistance mechanisms of imitanib; urge forward the development of second generation drugs. Nilotinib, a second generation drug is more potent inhibitor of BCR-ABL than imatinib. But nilotinib also develops dermatologic events and headache in patients. Large information about BCR-ABL structure and its inhibitors are now available. Based on the pharmacophore modeling approaches, it is possible to decipher the molecular determinants to inhibit BCR-ABL. We conducted a structure based and ligand based study to identify potent natural compounds as BCR-ABL inhibitor. First kinase inhibitors were docked with the receptor (BCR-ABL) and nilotinib was selected as a pharmacophore due its high binding efficiency. Eleven compounds were selected out of 1457 substances which have mutual pharmacopohre features with nilotinib. These eleven compounds were validated and used for docking study to find the drug like molecules. The best molecules from the final set of screening candidates can be evaluated in cell lines and may represent a novel class of BCR-ABL inhibitors.

Abbreviations

CML - Chronic myeloid leukemia, PDGFR - Platelet derived growth factor receptor, TKI - Tyrosine kinase inhibitors.