1. Academic Validation
  2. Structure-based discovery of potent CARM1 inhibitors for colorectal cancer therapy

Structure-based discovery of potent CARM1 inhibitors for colorectal cancer therapy

  • Eur J Med Chem. 2024 Mar 4:269:116288. doi: 10.1016/j.ejmech.2024.116288.
Chenyu Liu 1 Yang Li 1 Zhihao Liu 2 Chenxi Cao 3 Min Lin 2 Xin Chen 2 Mengting Yuan 2 Yaohua Fan 3 Xiaodong Gu 3 Lei Wang 2 Fan Yang 4 Fei Ye 5 Jia Jin 6
Affiliations

Affiliations

  • 1 Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Molecular Therapeutics and New Drug Development, School of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, East China Normal University, Shanghai, 200062, China.
  • 2 College of Life Sciences and Medicine, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou, 310018, China.
  • 3 Department of Oncology, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Jiaxing University, No. 397, Huangcheng North Road, Jiaxing, 314000, China.
  • 4 Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Molecular Therapeutics and New Drug Development, School of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, East China Normal University, Shanghai, 200062, China. Electronic address: fyang@chem.ecnu.edu.cn.
  • 5 College of Life Sciences and Medicine, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou, 310018, China. Electronic address: yefei@zstu.edu.cn.
  • 6 College of Life Sciences and Medicine, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou, 310018, China. Electronic address: aukaukauk@163.com.
Abstract

Coactivator-associated arginine methyltransferase 1 (CARM1) plays an important role in cell proliferation and gene expression, and is highly expressed in a variety of tumor tissues. Guided by our previous reported structure of DCPR049_12, we focused on designing and evaluating selective CARM1 inhibitors, resulting in the identification of compound 11f as a promising lead candidate. Compound 11f displayed potent inhibition of CARM1 (IC50 = 9 nM). Comprehensive evaluations, including in vitro metabolic stability assessments, molecular modelling, cellular studies, and in vivo anti-tumor studies, confirmed that it induced Cancer cell Apoptosis and specifically inhibited CARM1's methylation function. Notably, compound 11f displayed significant anti-proliferative effects on colorectal Cancer cell lines, showcasing its potential for targeted therapies against CARM1-related diseases. This study provides valuable insights for the future development of specific and effective CARM1 inhibitors.

Keywords

Antitumor; Arginine methyltransferase; Inhibitor; Methylate; PRMTs.

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