Pseudo-Dipeptide Bearing α,α-Difluoromethyl Ketone Moiety as Electrophilic Warhead with Activity against Coronaviruses
| Autor: | Andrea Citarella, Davide Gentile, Antonio Rescifina, Anna Piperno, Barbara Mognetti, Giorgio Gribaudo, Maria Teresa Sciortino, Wolfgang Holzer, Vittorio Pace, Nicola Micale |
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| Jazyk: | angličtina |
| Rok vydání: | 2021 |
| Předmět: | |
| Zdroj: | International Journal of Molecular Sciences, Vol 22, Iss 3, p 1398 (2021) |
| Druh dokumentu: | article |
| ISSN: | 1422-0067 1661-6596 |
| DOI: | 10.3390/ijms22031398 |
| Popis: | The synthesis of α-fluorinated methyl ketones has always been challenging. New methods based on the homologation chemistry via nucleophilic halocarbenoid transfer, carried out recently in our labs, allowed us to design and synthesize a target-directed dipeptidyl α,α-difluoromethyl ketone (DFMK) 8 as a potential antiviral agent with activity against human coronaviruses. The ability of the newly synthesized compound to inhibit viral replication was evaluated by a viral cytopathic effect (CPE)-based assay performed on MCR5 cells infected with one of the four human coronaviruses associated with respiratory distress, i.e., hCoV-229E, showing antiproliferative activity in the micromolar range (EC50 = 12.9 ± 1.22 µM), with a very low cytotoxicity profile (CC50 = 170 ± 3.79 µM, 307 ± 11.63 µM, and 174 ± 7.6 µM for A549, human embryonic lung fibroblasts (HELFs), and MRC5 cells, respectively). Docking and molecular dynamics simulations studies indicated that 8 efficaciously binds to the intended target hCoV-229E main protease (Mpro). Moreover, due to the high similarity between hCoV-229E Mpro and SARS-CoV-2 Mpro, we also performed the in silico analysis towards the second target, which showed results comparable to those obtained for hCoV-229E Mpro and promising in terms of energy of binding and docking pose. |
| Databáze: | Directory of Open Access Journals |
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