Building skeletally diverse architectures on the Indoline Scaffold: the discovery of a chemical probe of focal adhesion kinase signaling networks

Inspired by bioactive indoline alkaloid natural products, here, we report a divergent synthesis approach that led to skeletally diverse indoline alkaloid-inspired compounds. The natural product-inspired compounds obtained were then subjected to a series of in vitro and cellular assays to examine their properties as modulators of focal adhesion kinase (FAK) activity. This study resulted in the identification of a promising lead inhibitor of FAK (42), which also showed activity in a wound healing and cell invasion assay. The in silico study of the lead compound (42) was also undertaken.     

Natural product-like chemical space: search for chemical dissectors of macromolecular interactions

Macromolecular interactions (i.e. protein-protein or DNA/RNA-protein interactions) play important cellular roles, including cellular communication and programmed cell death. Small-molecule chemical probes are crucial for dissecting these highly organized interactions, for mapping their function at the molecular level and developing new therapeutics. The lack of ideal chemical probes required to understand macromolecular interactions is the missing link in the next step of dissecting such interactions. Unfortunately, the classical combinatorial-chemistry community has not successfully provided the required probes (i.e. natural product inspired chemical probes that are rich in stereochemical and three-dimensional structural diversity) to achieve these goals. The emerging area of diversity-oriented synthesis (DOS) is beginning to provide natural product-like chemical probes that may be useful in this arena.     

Structuring of the 3' splice site by U2AF65

Recognition of the 3' splice site in mammalian introns is accomplished by association of the splicing factor U2AF with the precursor mRNA (pre-mRNA) in a multiprotein splicing commitment complex. It is well established that this interaction involves binding of the large U2AF65 subunit to sequences upstream of the 3' splice site, but the orientation of the four domains of this protein with respect to the RNA and hence their role in structuring the commitment complex remain unclear and the basis of contradictory models. We have examined the interaction of U2AF65 with an RNA representing the 3' splice site using a series of U2AF deletion mutants modified at the N terminus with the directed hydroxyl radical probe iron-EDTA. These studies, combined with an analysis of extant high resolution x-ray structures of protein.RNA complexes, suggest a model whereby U2AF65 bends the pre-mRNA to juxtapose reactive functionalities of the pre-mRNA substrate and organize these structures for subsequent spliceosome assembly.     

Inhibitors of adenosine deaminase: continued studies of structure-activity relationships in analogues of coformycin

Synthesis and adenosine deaminase (ADA) inhibitory activity of two analogues of coformycin, containing the imidazo[4,5-e][1,2,4]triazepine ring system, have been reported as part of the structure-activity relationship (SAR) studies to explore the factors responsible for the extremely tight-binding characteristics of coformycins to ADA.