A novel self-assemble peptide drug design of AKT1 for anaplastic thyroid cancer therapy.

ABSTRACT

Anaplastic thyroid cancer (ATC) is an undifferentiated subtype of thyroid cancer with a markedly poor survival prognosis, estimated to occur 3-5 months after diagnosis. Akt activation is reportedly involved in tumorigenesis during ATC and represents a new therapeutic target. Based on the Akt1/bisubstrate complex structure and artificial intelligence-assisted peptide drug screening, we designed a self-assemble Akt1-targeting peptide drug exhibiting a 0.89-nm structure and potential killing ability in ATC cells. The developed self-assemble Akt1-targeting peptide drug presented IC50 values of 18.2 µM and 12.4 µM in 8303C and 8505C cells, respectively, after 72 h of incubation.