Abstract
Recent studies have shown that Ephrin receptors may be upregulated in several types of cancers including breast, ovarian and endometrial cancers, making them a target for drug design. In this work, we have utilized a target-hopping approach to design new natural product-peptide conjugates and examined their interactions with the kinase-binding domain of EphB4 and EphB2 receptors. The peptide sequences were generated through point mutations of the known EphB4 antagonist peptide TNYLFSPNGPIA. Their anticancer properties and secondary structures were analyzed computationally. Conjugates of most optimum of peptides were then designed by binding the N-terminal of the peptides with the free carboxyl group of the polyphenols sinapate, gallate and coumarate, which are known for their inherent anticancer properties. To investigate if these conjugates have a potential to bind to the kinase domain, we carried out docking studies and MMGBSA free energy calculations of the trajectories based on the molecular dynamics simulations, with both the apo and the ATP bound kinase domains of both receptors. In most cases binding interactions occurred within the catalytic loop region, while in some cases the conjugates were found to spread out across the N-lobe and the DFG motif region. The conjugates were further tested for prediction of pharmacokinetic properties using ADME studies. Our results indicated that the conjugates were lipophilic and MDCK permeable with no CYP interactions. These findings provide an insight into the molecular interactions of these peptides and conjugates with the kinase domain of the EphB4 and EphB2 receptor. As a proof of concept, we synthesized and carried out SPR analysis with two of the conjugates (gallate-TNYLFSPNGPIA and sinapate-TNYLFSPNGPIA). Results indicated that the conjugates showed higher binding with the EphB4 receptor and minimal binding to EphB2 receptor. Sinapate-TNYLFSPNGPIA showed inhibitory activity against EphB4. These studies reveal that some of the conjugates may be developed for further investigation into in vitro and in vivo studies and potential development as therapeutics.