Dexibuprofen amide derivatives as potential anticancer agents: synthesis, in silico docking, bioevaluation, and molecular dynamic simulation

Zaman Ashraf,1 Tariq Mahmood,1 Mubashir Hassan,2 Samina Afzal,3 Hummera Rafique4 Khurram Afzal,3 Jalifah Latip5 1Department of Chemistry, Allama Iqbal Open University, Islamabad, Pakistan; 2Department of Biology, College of Natural Sciences, Kongju National University, Gongju, Republic of Korea; 3Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, Faculty of Pharmacy, Bahauddin Zakria University, Multan, Pakistan; 4Department of Chemistry, University of Gujrat, Gujrat, Pakistan; 5Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, School of Chemical Sciences & Food Technology, Faculty of Science and Technology, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia Background: The amide derivatives of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs have been reported to possess antitumor activity. The present work describes the synthesis of dexibuprofen amide analogues (4a–j) as potential anticancer agents. Methods: The title amides (4a–j) were obtained by simple nucleophilic substitution reaction of dexibuprofen acid chloride with substituted amines in good yield and chemical structures were confirmed by FTIR, 1H NMR, 13C NMR and mass spectral data. Results: The brine shrimp lethality assay results showed that all of the synthesized compounds are non-toxic to shrimp larvae. The inhibitory effects on tumor growth were evaluated and it was observed that N-(2,5-dichlorophenyl)-2-(4-isobutylphenyl) propionamide (4e) and N-(2-chlorophenyl)-2-(4-isobutylphenyl) propionamide (4g) exhibited excellent antitumor activity compared to all other derivatives. The compound 4e bearing 2,5-dichloro substituted phenyl ring and 4g possesses 2-chloro substituted phenyl ring exhibited 100% inhibition of the tumor growth. The anticancer activity was evaluated against breast carcinoma cell line (MCF-7) and it was observed that derivative 4e exhibited excellent growth inhibition of cancer cells with IC50 value of 0.01±0.002µm, which is better than the standard drugs. The docking studies against breast cancer type 1 susceptibility protein BRCA1 (PDBID 3K0H) exhibited good binding affinities, which are in good agreement with the wet lab results. The compounds 4e and 4g showed the binding energy values of -6.39 and -6.34Kcal/mol, respectively. The molecular dynamic (MD) simulation was also carried out to evaluate the residual flexibility of the best docking complexes of compounds 4e and 4g. The MD simulation analysis assured that the 4e formed a more stable complex with the target protein than the 4g. The synthesized amide derivatives exhibited were devoid of gastrointestinal side effects and no cytotoxic effects against human normal epithelial breast cell line (MCF-12A) were found. Conclusion: Based upon our wet lab and dry lab findings we propose that dexibuprofen ana­logue 4e may serve as a lead structure for the design of more potent anticancer drugs. Keywords: dexibuprofen analogues, preparation, computational studies, cytotoxicity, anti­cancer activity