Stepwise Evolution of Fragment Hits against MAPK Interacting Kinases 1 and 2.

Dysregulation of translation initiation factor 4E (eIF4E) activity occurs in various cancers. Mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) interacting kinases 1 and 2 (MNK1 and MNK2) play a fundamental role in activation of eIF4E. Structure-activity relationship-driven expansion of a fragment hit led to discovery of dual MNK1 and MNK2 inhibitors based on a novel pyridine-benzamide scaffold. The compounds possess promising in vitro and in vivo pharmacokinetic profiles and show potent on target inhibition of eIF4E phosphorylation in cells.

Predicting chemotherapeutic drug combinations through gene network profiling.

Contemporary chemotherapeutic treatments incorporate the use of several agents in combination. However, selecting the most appropriate drugs for such therapy is not necessarily an easy or straightforward task. Here, we describe a targeted approach that can facilitate the reliable selection of chemotherapeutic drug combinations through the interrogation of drug-resistance gene networks. Our method employed single-cell eukaryote fission yeast (Schizosaccharomyces pombe) as a model of proliferating cells to delineate a drug resistance gene network using a synthetic lethality workflow. Using the results of a previous unbiased screen, we assessed the genetic overlap of doxorubicin with six other drugs harboring varied mechanisms of action. Using this fission yeast model, drug-specific ontological sub-classifications were identified through the computation of relative hypersensitivities. We found that human gastric adenocarcinoma cells can be sensitized to doxorubicin by concomitant treatment with cisplatin, an intra-DNA strand crosslinking agent, and suberoylanilide hydroxamic acid, a histone deacetylase inhibitor. Our findings point to the utility of fission yeast as a model and the differential targeting of a conserved gene interaction network when screening for successful chemotherapeutic drug combinations for human cells.