Novel small-molecule inhibitors of Bcl-XL to treat lung cancer.

ABSTRACT: Bcl-XL is a major antiapoptotic protein in the Bcl-2 family whose overexpression is more widely observed in human lung cancer cells than that of Bcl-2, suggesting that Bcl-XL is more biologically relevant and therefore a better therapeutic target for lung cancer. Here, we screened small molecules that selectively target the BH3 domain (aa 90-98) binding pocket of Bcl-XL using the UCSF DOCK 6.1 program suite and the NCI chemical library database. We identified two new Bcl-XL inhibitors (BXI-61 and BXI-72) that exhibit selective toxicity against lung cancer cells compared with normal human bronchial epithelial cells. Fluorescence polarization assay reveals that BXI-61 and BXI-72 preferentially bind to Bcl-XL protein but not Bcl2, Bcl-w, Bfl-1/A1, or Mcl-1 in vitro with high binding affinitie

SUBMITTER: Park D 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3774010 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature