ACS Medicinal Chemistry Letters
Featured Letter
To obtain JNK3 inhibitors having higher drugability for
CNS applications, our optimizations will focus on two areas, as
shown in Figure 1: the left-side N-phenyl amide group (Area-
A) and the right-side aniline phenyl moiety (Area-B). Based on
was applied (analogue 6), which exhibited a JNK3 inhibition
IC of 0.05 μM and had high isoform selectivity against JNK1
5
0
(IC : 3.6 μM, 72-fold selectivity). Moreover, both 5 and 6 had
5
0
almost no inhibitions to their closely related kinase p38α (IC50
> 20 μM). Therefore, the chemotype incorporating a 3,5-
disubstituted thiophene ring (as in 6) will be used for further
optimizations.
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the cocrystal structure of 2 in JNK3, small substitutions (R1)
other than the 2-Cl) to the aniline phenyl group (Area-B)
(
could be tolerated. We reasoned that substitutions by electron-
withdrawing groups might be able to improve PK properties
and reduce potential metabolic toxicity. Our previous SAR
studies demonstrated that the left-side amide NH moiety is
indispensable for a high JNK3 affinity. Based on the crystal
structure of 2 in JNK3, the phenyl ring of the benzamide
provided hydrophobic interactions with surrounding protein
residues and thus could be replaced by other aromatic
structures without significantly affecting the JNK3 inhibition
activity.
We then attempted to optimize the amide moiety in
compound 6. As shown in Table 1, various amides were
prepared to optimize the JNK3 inhibitory potency and isoform
selectivity against JNK1 and JNK2 (assessed by the ratio of the
IC50 value of JNK1 or JNK2 over JNK3). In terms of JNK3
inhibitory activity, simple alkyl amides (7 and 8) resulted in a
reduction of JNK3 inhibition compared to the heterocyclic
ring-containing amide 6. Replacing the azetidine with an R-
configured pyrrolidine (9) also reduced the JNK3 inhibition.
N-Methylation to the ring-nitrogen (10) gained some activity.
Interestingly, deuteration to the N-methyl group (11) did not
affect the activity at all. On the other hand, changing the
chirality of the pyrrolidine ring from R to S (12) led to an
increase in JNK3 inhibitory activity. Moreover, application of a
bulkier N-substitution (13) further increased the JNK3
inhibition. Further increasing the ring size led to a slight
decrease in JNK3 inhibition (14 vs 12). However, replacing
the ring nitrogen with an oxygen (15) could gain JNK3
inhibitory activity. In addition, replacing the 2H-pyran in 15 by
a tetrahydrofuran ring (16) led to a compound with a very
high JNK3 inhibitory activity (IC : 8 nM). Further decreasing
We herein report the SAR optimizations based on these two
areas of lead compounds 1 and 2. Highly potent and selective
(
including isoform selectivity against JNK1) JNK3 inhibitors
were obtained from the optimizations. In addition, the
optimized novel JNK3 inhibitors exhibited oral bioavailability
and good brain penetration. The synthesis, purification, and
characterization of all JNK3 inhibitors (analogues 3−28) were
The first step in our optimizations was to replace the phenyl
ring in Area-A with a 5-membered aromatic moiety. We started
5
0
the ring size by applying an oxetane moiety (17) resulted in
some loss of JNK3 inhibitory activity, but the IC50 of 17 was
still comparable to or slightly better than that of lead 6.
Interestingly, α-methyl substitution to the oxetane ring (18)
did not significantly affect the JNK3 inhibition. Insertion of a
methylene group between the heterocyclic ring and the amine
moiety (compounds 19 to 24) led to deteriorated JNK3
inhibitors. Generally, these compounds had lower JNK3
inhibitions as compared to their corresponding analogues,
such as 19 vs 14, 21 vs 12, and 22 vs 16. The only exception is
compound 24. Its IC50 value was about half that of its
corresponding analogue 15.
Similar to lead inhibitors 5 and 6, the IC50 values against
p38α for compounds listed in Table 1 were all greater than 20
μM, indicating a generally excellent selectivity of this pyrazole-
urea based scaffold against kinase p38α (the selectivity for
most compounds is >100-fold). Ιn terms of the isoform
selectivity against JNK1, some compounds showed a fair
selectivity (R value between 20 and 50), such as compounds 9,
1
4, 15, and 19−22; many compounds exhibited a good
selectivity (R value between 50 and 100), such as compounds
, 8, 10−14, 18, and 24; and a few compounds demonstrated
Figure 2. Optimization of Area-A: replacement of the benzamide
phenyl ring by a 5-membered aromatic moiety.
6
an excellent selectivity (R value greater than 100), such as
compounds 7, 16, 17, and 23. In summary, amides with a
nitrogen-containing heterocyclic ring gave lower selectivity,
and amides with a methylene moiety inserted between the
heterocycle and the amino group exhibited worse isoform
selectivity against JNK1. The rationales for isoform selectivity
of JNK3 over JNK1 have been elucidated in our previous
analogue 3 had no inhibitions to either JNK3 or JNK1. We
reasoned that the H-bond acceptor nitrogen in the thiazole
ring might have disturbed the optimal hinge-binding patterns
for the inhibitor to JNK3. We then switched to no-nitrogen-
containing thiophene moieties for a replacement. Indeed,
much better JNK3 inhibitory activities were observed. The 2,6-
disubstitution pattern analogue 4 gave a submicromolar IC50
JNK3 inhibition (0.8 μM) while still keeping a good isoform
selectivity against JNK1. Even higher JNK3 inhibition (and
isoform selectivity against JNK1) was observed for the 2,4-
disubstitution analogue 5 (IC : 0.2 μM). The best JNK3
26
publications.
In our previous studies, we demonstrated that, by
crystallography and sequence residue mutation studies, isoform
26
selectivity against JNK2 is not easy to achieve. Nevertheless,
we still observed fair to excellent isoform selectivity against
JNK2 in some of our lead compounds. For example (Table 1),
50
inhibitor was obtained when a 3,5-disubstituted thiophene ring
B
ACS Med. Chem. Lett. XXXX, XXX, XXX−XXX