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Heterocycles in Medicinal Chemistry III

A special issue of Molecules (ISSN 1420-3049). This special issue belongs to the section "Medicinal Chemistry".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 28 February 2025 | Viewed by 2456

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
1. Department of Analytical Chemistry, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Comenius University, Ilkovicova 6, 84215 Bratislava, Slovakia
2. Department of Chemical Biology, Faculty of Science, Palacky University, Olomouc, Slechtitelu 27, 78371 Olomouc, Czech Republic
Interests: medicinal chemistry; drug design; structure–activity relationships; pharmaceutical analysis; polymorphism; drug bioavailability; ADME; nanoparticles; nanoformulations; controlled/targeted delivery
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

We announce with great pleasure the third edition of “Heterocycles in Medicinal Chemistry III”.

Heteroatoms constitute a very common fragment of several active pharmaceutical ingredients, as well as excipients; from the point of view of significance, it is all the same if these are isosterically/bioisosterically replaced carbons/carbon substructures in aliphatic structures or real heterocycles. Many heterocyclic scaffolds can be considered as privilege structures. Most frequently, nitrogen heterocycles or various positional combinations of nitrogen atoms, sulphur, and oxygen can be found in five- or six-membered rings. According to statistics, more than 85% of all biologically active chemical entities contain a heterocycle. This fact reflects the central role of heterocycles in modern drug design. The application of heterocycles provides a useful tool for the modification of solubility, lipophilicity, polarity, and hydrogen bonding capacity of biologically active agents, which results in the optimization of the ADME/Tox properties of drugs or drug candidates. The increasing presence of various heterocycles in drugs is related to advances in synthetic methodologies, such as metal-catalyzed cross-coupling and hetero-coupling reactions, that allow rapid access to a wide variety of functionalized heterocycles. On the other hand, many heterocyclic lead compounds were isolated from natural resources, and their structures were subsequently simplified and modified by medicinal chemists. Thus, heterocycles have critical importance for medicinal chemists because using them can expand the available drug-like chemical space and drive more effective drug discovery programmes. Medicinal chemistry is “a chemistry-based discipline, also involving aspects of biological, medical and pharmaceutical sciences” and “concerned with the invention, discovery, design, identification, and preparation of biologically active compounds, the study of their metabolism, the interpretation of their mode of action at the molecular level and the construction of structure-activity relationships”, this Special Issue of Molecules titled “Heterocycles in Medicinal Chemistry” is devoted to the following research topics focused on heterocycles: (i) synthesis and analysis; (ii) natural compounds; (iii) carbohydrates; (iv) drug design; (v) in silico investigations; (vi) biological screening; (vii) chemical biology and biological chemistry; (vii) biomaterials; and, in general, other topics related to heterocycles.

Prof. Dr. Josef Jampilek
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • drugs
  • heterocycles
  • pharmacophore
  • drug design
  • computer study
  • synthesis
  • analysis
  • natural compounds
  • carbohydrates
  • physicochemical properties
  • ADMET
  • biological screening
  • chemical biology
  • biological chemistry
  • biomaterials

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Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

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22 pages, 4312 KiB  
Article
Design, Synthesis, and Anticancer and Antibacterial Activities of Quinoline-5-Sulfonamides
by Andrzej Zieba, Dominika Pindjakova, Malgorzata Latocha, Justyna Plonka-Czerw, Dariusz Kusmierz, Alois Cizek and Josef Jampilek
Molecules 2024, 29(17), 4044; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules29174044 - 26 Aug 2024
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Abstract
A series of new unique acetylene derivatives of 8-hydroxy- and 8-methoxyquinoline- 5-sulfonamide 3af and 6af were prepared by reactions of 8-hydroxy- and 8-methoxyquinoline- 5-sulfonyl chlorides with acetylene derivatives of amine. A series of new hybrid systems containing quinoline and [...] Read more.
A series of new unique acetylene derivatives of 8-hydroxy- and 8-methoxyquinoline- 5-sulfonamide 3af and 6af were prepared by reactions of 8-hydroxy- and 8-methoxyquinoline- 5-sulfonyl chlorides with acetylene derivatives of amine. A series of new hybrid systems containing quinoline and 1,2,3-triazole systems 7ah were obtained by reactions of acetylene derivatives of quinoline-5-sulfonamide 6ad with organic azides. The structures of the obtained compounds were confirmed by 1H and 13C NMR spectroscopy and HR-MS spectrometry. The obtained quinoline derivatives 3af and 6af and 1,2,3-triazole derivatives 7ah were tested for their anticancer and antimicrobial activity. Human amelanotic melanoma cells (C-32), human breast adenocarcinoma cells (MDA-MB-231), and human lung adenocarcinoma cells (A549) were selected as tested cancer lines, while cytotoxicity was investigated on normal human dermal fibroblasts (HFF-1). All the compounds were also tested against reference strains Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 29213 and Enterococcus faecalis ATCC 29212 and representatives of multidrug-resistant clinical isolates of methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA) and vancomycin-resistant E. faecalis. Only the acetylene derivatives of 8-hydroxyquinoline-5-sulfonamide 3af were shown to be biologically active, and 8-hydroxy-N-methyl-N-(prop-2-yn-1-yl)quinoline-5-sulfonamide (3c) showed the highest activity against all three cancer lines and MRSA isolates. Its efficacies were comparable to those of cisplatin/doxorubicin and oxacillin/ciprofloxacin. In the non-cancer HFF-1 line, the compound showed no toxicity up to an IC50 of 100 µM. In additional tests, compound 3c decreased the expression of H3, increased the transcriptional activity of cell cycle regulators (P53 and P21 proteins), and altered the expression of BCL-2 and BAX genes in all cancer lines. The unsubstituted phenolic group at position 8 of the quinoline is the key structural fragment necessary for biological activity. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Heterocycles in Medicinal Chemistry III)
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26 pages, 3339 KiB  
Article
Novel Quinazoline Derivatives as Highly Effective A2A Adenosine Receptor Antagonists
by Amélie Laversin, Robin Dufossez, Raphaël Bolteau, Romain Duroux, Séverine Ravez, Sergio Hernandez-Tapia, Martin Fossart, Mathilde Coevoet, Maxime Liberelle, Saïd Yous, Nicolas Lebègue and Patricia Melnyk
Molecules 2024, 29(16), 3847; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules29163847 - 14 Aug 2024
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Abstract
The adenosine A2A receptor (A2AR) has been identified as a therapeutic target for treating neurodegenerative diseases and cancer. In recent years, we have highlighted the 2-aminoquinazoline heterocycle as an promising scaffold for designing new A2AR antagonists, exemplified by [...] Read more.
The adenosine A2A receptor (A2AR) has been identified as a therapeutic target for treating neurodegenerative diseases and cancer. In recent years, we have highlighted the 2-aminoquinazoline heterocycle as an promising scaffold for designing new A2AR antagonists, exemplified by 6-bromo-4-(furan-2-yl)quinazolin-2-amine 1 (Ki (hA2AR) = 20 nM). Here, we report the synthesis of new 2-aminoquinazoline derivatives with substitutions at the C6- and C7-positions, and the introduction of aminoalkyl chains containing tertiary amines at the C2-position to enhance antagonist activity and solubility properties. Compound 5m showed a high affinity for hA2AR with a Ki value of 5 nM and demonstrated antagonist activity with an IC50 of 6 µM in a cyclic AMP assay. Introducing aminopentylpiperidine and 4-[(piperidin-1-yl)methyl]aniline substituents maintained the binding affinities (9x, Ki = 21 nM; 10d, Ki = 15 nM) and functional antagonist activities (9x, IC50 = 9 µM; 10d, IC50 = 5 µM) of the synthesized compounds while improving solubility. This study provides insights into the future development of A2AR antagonists for therapeutic applications. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Heterocycles in Medicinal Chemistry III)
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Review

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31 pages, 6810 KiB  
Review
Synthetic Approaches, Properties, and Applications of Acylals in Preparative and Medicinal Chemistry
by Tobias Keydel and Andreas Link
Molecules 2024, 29(18), 4451; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules29184451 - 19 Sep 2024
Abstract
Diesters of geminal diols (R-CH(O-CO-R′)2, RR′C(OCOR″)2, etc. with R = H, aryl or alkyl) are termed acylals according to IUPAC recommendations (Rule P-65.6.3.6 Acylals) if the acids involved are carboxylic acids. Similar condensation products can be obtained from various [...] Read more.
Diesters of geminal diols (R-CH(O-CO-R′)2, RR′C(OCOR″)2, etc. with R = H, aryl or alkyl) are termed acylals according to IUPAC recommendations (Rule P-65.6.3.6 Acylals) if the acids involved are carboxylic acids. Similar condensation products can be obtained from various other acidic structures as well, but these related “non-classical acylals”, as one might call them, differ in various aspects from classical acylals and will not be discussed in this article. Carboxylic acid diesters of geminal diols play a prominent role in organic chemistry, not only in their application as protective groups for aldehydes and ketones but also as precursors in the total synthesis of natural compounds and in a variety of organic reactions. What is more, acylals are useful as a key structural motif in clinically validated prodrug approaches. In this review, we summarise the syntheses and chemical properties of such classical acylals and show what potentially under-explored possibilities exist in the field of drug design, especially prodrugs, and classify this functional group in medicinal chemistry. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Heterocycles in Medicinal Chemistry III)
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