Design, synthesis and biological evaluation of benzoic acid mustard derivatives of imidazole-containing and C-terminal carboxamide analogues of distamycin.

The synthesis, DNA binding and biological evaluation of two benzoic acid mustard derivatives of imidazole-containing analogues of distamycin in which the C-terminus is modified to contain a terminal carboxamide are described. The apparent DNA binding constants of compounds 5 and 6 were determined using an ethidium displacement assay, and the results showed that they do not have the AT sequence selectivity of distamycin and they show an acceptance for GC base pairs. Based on their pronounced binding to T4 DNA the data suggest that they bind to the minor groove of DNA. The cytotoxicities of compounds 5 and 6 in human chronic myeloid leukemia cells were determined using a MTT assay, and their IC50 values were 27 and 16 microM, respectively, and higher than the corresponding non-terminal carboxamide-containing analogues 3 and 4. Both compounds were however markedly more active than the non-targeted mustard BAM [N,N-bis (-2-chloroethyl)-4-aminobenzoic acid]. In the NCI panel of cell lines 5 gave a distinctly different pattern of tumor selectivity from 6. While these compounds were shown to alkylate DNA using a CD alkylation assay (35 +/- 10% for 5 and 85 +/- 10% for 6), they produced interstrand crosslinks poorly, even at 100 microM drug concentrations. Based on preliminary data from a polymerase stop assay compounds 3-6 gave different patterns of sequence selection monoalkylation which may contribute to their differing biological activities.