Discovery of ß-aminoacyl containing thiazolidine derivatives as potent and selective dipeptidyl peptidase IV inhibitors.

A series of ß-aminoacyl containing thiazolidine derivatives was synthesized and evaluated for their ability to inhibit DPP-IV. Several thiazolidine derivatives with an acid moiety were found to be potent DPP-IV inhibitors. Among them, compound 2da is the most active in this series with an IC(50) value of 1 nM, and it showed excellent selectivity over DPP-IV related enzymes including DPP-2, DPP-8, and DPP-9. Compound 2da is chemically and metabolically stable, and showed no CYP inhibition, hERG binding or cytotoxicity. Compound 2db, an ester prodrug of 2da, showed good in vivo DPP-IV inhibition after oral administration in rat and dog models.

Determination of a dipeptidyl peptidase IV agonist, ß-aminoacyl containing thiazolidine derivatives (KR-66223) in rat plasma by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry.

A sensitive liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) method was developed for a novel dipeptidyl peptidase IV agonist (DDP-IV) agonist, KR-66223, in rat plasma. It involves liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) followed by HPLC separation and electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry. KR-66223 and imipramine (IS) was separated on Gemini-NX C18 column with mixture of acetonitrile-ammonium formate (10mM) (90:10, v/v) as mobile phase. The ion transitions monitored were m/z 553.2→206.2 for KR-66223, m/z 281.3→86.1 for imipramine in multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) mode. The linear ranges of the assay were 0.003-10µg/ml with a correlation coefficient (R(2)) greater than 0.99 and the lower limit of quantification was 3ng/ml. The average recovery was 78.9% and 87.1% from rat plasma for KR-66223 and imipramine, respectively. The coefficients of variation of intra- and inter-assay were 3.9-14.4% and the relative error was 0.8-11.5%. The method was validated and successfully applied to the pharmacokinetic study of KR-66223 in rat.