RESUMO
The obligate intracellular parasite, Trypanosoma cruzi is the etiologic agent of Chagas disease or American trypanosomiasis, which is the most prevalent parasitic disease in the Americas. The present chemotherapy to control this illness is still deficient particularly in the chronic stage of the disease. The ergosterol biosynthesis pathway has received much attention as a molecular target for the development of new drugs for Chagas disease. Especially, inhibitors of the enzymatic activity of squalene synthase were shown to be effective compounds on T. cruzi proliferation in in vitro assays. In the present study we designed, synthesized and evaluated the effect of a number of isosteric analogues of WC-9 (4-phenoxyphenoxyethyl thiocyanate), a known squalene synthase inhibitor, on T. cruzi growth in tissue culture cells. The selenium-containing derivatives turned out to be extremely potent inhibitors of T. cruzi growth. Certainly, 3-phenoxyphenoxyethyl, 4-phenoxyphenoxyethyl, 4-(3-fluorophenoxy)phenoxyethyl, 3-(3-fluorophenoxy)phenoxyethyl selenocyanates and (±)-5-phenoxy-2-(selenocyanatomethyl)-2,3-dihydrobenzofuran arose as relevant members of this family of compounds, which exhibited effective ED50 values of 0.084⯵M, 0.11⯵M, 0.083,⯵M, 0.085, and 0.075⯵M, respectively. The results indicate that compounds bearing the selenocyanate moiety are at least two orders of magnitude more potent than the corresponding skeleton counterpart bearing the thiocyanate group. Surprisingly, these compounds exhibited excellent selectively index values ranging from 900 to 1800 making these molecules promising candidates as antiparasitic agents.
Assuntos
Éteres Fenílicos/farmacologia , Selênio/farmacologia , Tiocianatos/farmacologia , Tripanossomicidas/farmacologia , Trypanosoma cruzi/efeitos dos fármacos , Animais , Proliferação de Células/efeitos dos fármacos , Sobrevivência Celular/efeitos dos fármacos , Chlorocebus aethiops , Relação Dose-Resposta a Droga , Estrutura Molecular , Testes de Sensibilidade Parasitária , Éteres Fenílicos/síntese química , Éteres Fenílicos/química , Selênio/química , Relação Estrutura-Atividade , Tiocianatos/síntese química , Tiocianatos/química , Tripanossomicidas/síntese química , Tripanossomicidas/química , Trypanosoma cruzi/citologia , Trypanosoma cruzi/crescimento & desenvolvimento , Células VeroRESUMO
We tested a series of sulfur-containing linear bisphosphonates against Toxoplasma gondii, the etiologic agent of toxoplasmosis. The most potent compound (compound 22; 1-[(n-decylsulfonyl)ethyl]-1,1-bisphosphonic acid) is a sulfone-containing compound, which had a 50% effective concentration (EC50) of 0.11 ± 0.02 µM against intracellular tachyzoites. The compound showed low toxicity when tested in tissue culture with a selectivity index of >2,000. Compound 22 also showed high activity in vivo in a toxoplasmosis mouse model. The compound inhibited the Toxoplasma farnesyl diphosphate synthase (TgFPPS), but the concentration needed to inhibit 50% of the enzymatic activity (IC50) was higher than the concentration that inhibited 50% of growth. We tested compound 22 against two other apicomplexan parasites, Plasmodium falciparum (EC50 of 0.6 ± 0.01 µM), the agent of malaria, and Cryptosporidium parvum (EC50 of â¼65 µM), the agent of cryptosporidiosis. Our results suggest that compound 22 is an excellent novel compound that could lead to the development of potent agents against apicomplexan parasites.