Search results for " preclinical"
showing 10 items of 159 documents
Antiproliferative Effects of St. John’s Wort, Its Derivatives, and Other Hypericum Species in Hematologic Malignancies
2021
Hypericumis a widely present plant, and extracts of its leaves, flowers, and aerial elements have been employed for many years as therapeutic cures for depression, skin wounds, and respiratory and inflammatory disorders. Hypericum also displays an ample variety of other biological actions, such as hypotensive, analgesic, anti-infective, anti-oxidant, and spasmolytic abilities. However, recent investigations highlighted that this species could be advantageous for the cure of other pathological situations, such as trigeminal neuralgia, as well as in the treatment of cancer. This review focuses on the in vitro and in vivo antitumor effects of St. John’s Wort (Hypericum perforatum), its derivat…
2-(2,6-Dihalophenyl)-3-(pyrimidin-2-yl)-1,3-thiazolidin-4-ones as non-nucleoside HIV-1 reverse transcriptase inhibitors.
2004
Several 1,3-thiazolidin-4-ones bearing a 2,6-dihalophenyl group at C-2 and a substituted pyrimidin-2-yl ring at the N-3 were synthesised and evaluated as anti-HIV agents. The results of the in vitro tests showed that some of them were highly effective inhibitors of human immunodeficiency virus type-1 (HIV-1) replication at 10–40 nM concentrations with minimal cytotoxicity. Structure–activity relationship studies revealed that the nature of the substituents at the 2 and 3 positions of the thiazolidinone nucleus had a significant impact on the in vitro anti-HIV activity of this class of potent antiretroviral agents. The compounds had significantly reduced activity against the characteristic N…
Halothane inhibits endothelium-dependent relaxation elicited by acetylcholine in human isolated pulmonary arteries.
1997
This study examined whether a clinically relevant concentration of the volatile anaesthetic halothane modifies the endothelium-dependent relaxation produced by acetylcholine (3 nM-10 microM), histamine (1 pM-0.1 microM) and anti-human immunoglobulin E (1:1000) in human isolated pulmonary arteries submaximally precontracted with noradrenaline. An inhibitor of nitric oxide formation, N(G)-nitro-L-arginine (100 microM), attenuated acetylcholine-induced relaxation but failed to inhibit histamine- and anti-human immunoglobulin E-induced relaxation. Indomethacin (2.8 microM, a cyclooxygenase inhibitor) preferentially reduced the relaxation to histamine and anti-human IgE. Halothane (2%) significa…
Fingolimod (FTY720-P) Does Not Stabilize the Blood–Brain Barrier under Inflammatory Conditions in an in Vitro Model
2015
Breakdown of the blood-brain barrier (BBB) is an early hallmark of multiple sclerosis (MS), a progressive inflammatory disease of the central nervous system. Cell adhesion in the BBB is modulated by sphingosine-1-phosphate (S1P), a signaling protein, via S1P receptors (S1P\(_1\)). Fingolimod phosphate (FTY720-P) a functional S1P\(_1\) antagonist has been shown to improve the relapse rate in relapsing-remitting MS by preventing the egress of lymphocytes from lymph nodes. However, its role in modulating BBB permeabilityin particular, on the tight junction proteins occludin, claudin 5 and ZO-1has not been well elucidated to date. In the present study, FTY720-P did not change the transendotheli…
Hepatocyte cell lines: their use, scope and limitations in drug metabolism studies.
2006
Gaining knowledge on the metabolism of a drug, the enzymes involved and its inhibition or induction potential is a necessary step in pharmaceutical development of new compounds. Primary human hepatocytes are considered a cellular model of reference, as they express the majority of drug-metabolising enzymes, respond to enzyme inducers and are capable of generating in vitro a metabolic profile similar to what is found in vivo. However, hepatocytes show phenotypic instability and have a restricted accessibility. Different alternatives have been explored in the past recent years to overcome the limitations of primary hepatocytes. These include immortalisation of adult or fetal human hepatic cel…
Advances in Marine Natural Products of the Indole and Annelated Indole Series: Chemical and Biological Aspects
2001
Marine natural products, form a field of scientific endeavour, that has recently grown considerably. The isolation, biological evaluation, chemical properties and synthetic elaborations of products of marine organisms have attracted the attention of organic chemists, medicinal chemists, biologists and pharmacists. In this context a structurally and biologically highly interesting class is represented by the marine natural products containing an indole moiety in a pure substituted form or in an anellated form. The present review summarizes primarily the actual results concerning these products as new pharmacologically attractive lead compounds for drug design. The chemistry, biological evalu…
Fragment- and negative image-based screening of phosphodiesterase 10A inhibitors.
2019
A novel virtual screening methodology called fragment- and negative image-based (F-NiB) screening is introduced and tested experimentally using phosphodiesterase 10A (PDE10A) as a case study. Potent PDE10A-specific small-molecule inhibitors are actively sought after for their antipsychotic and neuroprotective effects. The F-NiB combines features from both fragment-based drug discovery and negative image-based (NIB) screening methodologies to facilitate rational drug discovery. The selected structural parts of protein-bound ligand(s) are seamlessly combined with the negative image of the target's ligand-binding cavity. This cavity- and fragment-based hybrid model, namely its shape and electr…
IMI – Oral biopharmaceutics tools project – Evaluation of bottom-up PBPK prediction success part 2: An introduction to the simulation exercise and ov…
2016
Orally administered drugs are subject to a number of barriers impacting bioavailability (Foral), causing challenges during drug and formulation development. Physiologically-based pharmacokinetic (PBPK) modelling can help during drug and formulation development by providing quantitative predictions through a systems approach. The performance of three available PBPK software packages (GI-Sim, Simcyp®, and GastroPlus™) were evaluated by comparing simulated and observed pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters.Since the availability of input parameters was heterogeneous and highly variable, caution is required when interpreting the results of this exercise. Additionally, this prospective simulation exer…
IMI – Oral biopharmaceutics tools project – Evaluation of bottom-up PBPK prediction success part 3: Identifying gaps in system parameters by analysin…
2016
Three Physiologically Based Pharmacokinetic software packages (GI-Sim, Simcyp® Simulator, and GastroPlus™) were evaluated as part of the Innovative Medicine Initiative Oral Biopharmaceutics Tools project (OrBiTo) during a blinded “bottom-up” anticipation of human pharmacokinetics. After data analysis of the predicted vs. measured pharmacokinetics parameters, it was found that oral bioavailability (Foral) was underpredicted for compounds with low permeability, suggesting improper estimates of intestinal surface area, colonic absorption and/or lack of intestinal transporter information. Foral was also underpredicted for acidic compounds, suggesting overestimation of impact of ionisation on pe…
Antitumor effects of dehydroxymethylepoxyquinomicin, a novel nuclear factor-kappaB inhibitor, in human liver cancer cells are mediated through a reac…
2009
Activation of the nuclear transcription factor-kappa B (NF-kappa B) has been implicated in liver tumorigenesis. We evaluated the effects of a novel NF-kappa B inhibitor, dehydroxymethylepoxyquinomicin (DHMEQ), in two human liver cancer cell lines HA22T/VGH and HuH-6. DHMEQ treatment dose dependently decreased the DNA-binding capacity of the NF-kappa B p65 subunit, inhibited cell growth and proliferation, and increased apoptosis as shown by caspase activation, release of cytochrome c, poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase cleavage, and down-regulation of survivin. DHMEQ also induced a dose-dependent activation of mitogen-activated protein kinase kinase/extracellular signal-regulated kinase signaling, …