Design, synthesis and pharmacological evaluation of new acyl sulfonamides as potent and selective Bcl-2 inhibitors

Publication date: 15 January 2018
Source:Bioorganic & Medicinal Chemistry, Volume 26, Issue 2
Author(s): Xiaohua Liu, Yu Zhang, Wenjing Huang, Wenfu Tan, Ao Zhang
The antiapoptotic protein Bcl-2, overexpressed in many tumor cells, is an attractive target for potential small molecule anticancer drug discovery. Herein, we report a different structural modification approach on ABT-263 by merging the piperazinyl-phenyl fragment into a bicyclic framework leading to a series of novel analogues, among which tetrahydroisoquinoline 13 was nearly equally potent against Bcl-2 as ABT-263. Further SAR in the P4-interaction pocket affored the difluoroazetidine substituted analogue 55, which retained good Bcl-2 activity with improved Bcl-2/Bcl-xL selectivity.

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