Identification, Characterization, and Synthesis of Natural Parasitic Cysteine Protease Inhibitors: Pentacitidins Are More Potent Falcitidin Analogues.
Stephan BrinkmannSandra SemmlerChristian KerstenMaria A PatrasMichael KurzNatalie FuchsStefan J HammerschmidtJenny LegacPeter E HammannAndreas VilcinskasPhilip J RosenthalTanja SchirmeisterArmin BauerTill F SchäberlePublished in: ACS chemical biology (2022)
Protease inhibitors represent a promising therapeutic option for the treatment of parasitic diseases such as malaria and human African trypanosomiasis. Falcitidin was the first member of a new class of inhibitors of falcipain-2, a cysteine protease of the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum . Using a metabolomics dataset of 25 Chitinophaga strains for molecular networking enabled identification of over 30 natural analogues of falcitidin. Based on MS/MS spectra, they vary in their amino acid chain length, sequence, acyl residue, and C-terminal functionalization; therefore, they were grouped into the four falcitidin peptide families A-D. The isolation, characterization, and absolute structure elucidation of two falcitidin-related pentapeptide aldehyde analogues by extensive MS/MS spectrometry and NMR spectroscopy in combination with advanced Marfey's analysis was in agreement with the in silico analysis of the corresponding biosynthetic gene cluster. Total synthesis of chosen pentapeptide analogues followed by in vitro testing against a panel of proteases revealed selective parasitic cysteine protease inhibition and, additionally, low-micromolar inhibition of α-chymotrypsin. The pentapeptides investigated here showed superior inhibitory activity compared to falcitidin.
Keyphrases
- plasmodium falciparum
- molecular docking
- ms ms
- amino acid
- structure activity relationship
- fluorescent probe
- living cells
- endothelial cells
- escherichia coli
- liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry
- mass spectrometry
- high resolution
- copy number
- genome wide
- bioinformatics analysis
- fatty acid
- atomic force microscopy
- dna methylation
- density functional theory
- replacement therapy
- simultaneous determination
- high speed