Developing new chemical tools for DNA methyltransferase 1 (DNMT 1): a small-molecule activity-based probe and novel tetrazole-containing inhibitors.

DNA methylation is an important epigenetic modification catalyzed by DNA methyltransferases (DNMTs). Abnormal expression of endogenous DNMTs in human causes alterations in the genome methylation patterns which subsequently lead to the development of cancers. Thus detection of endogenous DNMT activities and efficient inhibition of DNMTs have important therapeutic significance. In this work, a small molecule activity-based probe (ABP) of DNA methyltransferase 1 (DNMT1), T1, was developed. The probe was a clickable analog of tryptophan and was able to covalently label endogenous DNMT1 and inhibit its enzymatic activity more effectively than previously known DNMT1 inhibitors (RG108 and its maleimide analog 1149). In addition, we also discovered a new type of small molecule DNMT inhibitors based on tetrazole-containing compounds which were analogs of 1149. Among these compounds, which we called Gn, one of them (G6) possessed reasonable inhibitory activity against DNMT1 in both in vitro enzymatic assays and cell growth proliferation experiments. Both T1 and G6 showed effective labeling of endogenous DNMT1 from mammalian cells by using in vitro competitive pull-down and live-cell bioimaging experiments.