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Emerging and re-emerging viruses periodically cause outbreaks and epidemics all over the world, eventually leading to global events such as the current pandemic of the novel SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus infection COVID-19. Therefore, an urgent need for novel antivirals is crystal clear. Here we present the synthesis and evaluation of an antiviral activity of phenoxazine-based nucleoside analogs divided into three groups: (1) 8-alkoxy-substituted, (2) acyclic, and (3) carbocyclic. The antiviral activity was assessed against a structurally and phylogenetically diverse panel of RNA and DNA viruses from 25 species. Four compounds (11a-c, 12c) inhibited 4 DNA/RNA viruses with EC 50  ≤ 20 μM. Toxicity of the compounds for the cell lines used for virus cultivation was negligible in most cases. In addition, previously reported and newly synthesized phenoxazine derivatives were evaluated against SARS-CoV-2, and some of them showed promising inhibition of reproduction with EC 50 values in low micromolar range, although accompanied by commensurate cytotoxicity., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.)

Rigid amphipathic fusion inhibitors are potent broad-spectrum antivirals based on the perylene scaffold, usually decorated with a hydrophilic group linked via ethynyl or triazole. We have sequentially simplified these structures by removing sugar moiety, then converting uridine to aniline, then moving to perylenylthiophenecarboxylic acids and to perylenylcarboxylic acid. All these polyaromatic compounds, as well as antibiotic heliomycin, still showed pronounced activity against tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV) with limited toxicity in porcine embryo kidney (PEK) cell line. 5-(Perylen-3-yl)-2-thiophenecarboxylic acid (5a) showed the highest antiviral activity with 50% effective concentration of approx. 1.6 nM., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

The phenoxazine scaffold is widely used to stabilize nucleic acid duplexes, as a part of fluorescent probes for the study of nucleic acid structure, recognition, and metabolism, etc. Here we present the synthesis of phenoxazine-based nucleoside derivatives and their antiviral activity against a panel of structurally diverse viruses: enveloped DNA herpesviruses varicella zoster virus (VZV) and human cytomegalovirus, enveloped RNA tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV), and non-enveloped RNA enteroviruses. Studied compounds were effective against DNA and RNA viruses reproduction in cell culture. 3-(2'-Deoxy-β-D-ribofuranosyl)-1,3-diaza-2-oxophenoxazine proved to be a potent inhibitor of VZV replication with superior activity against wild type than thymidine kinase deficient strains (EC 50 0.06 and 10 μM, respectively). This compound did not show cytotoxicity on all the studied cell lines. Several compounds showed promising activity against TBEV (EC 50 0.35-0.91 μM), but the activity was accompanied by pronounced cytotoxicity. These compounds may be considered as a good starting point for further structure optimization as antiherpesviral or antiflaviviral compounds., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

A series of analogues of potent antiviral perylene nucleoside dUY11 with methylthiomethyl (MTM), azidomethyl (AZM) and HO-C 1-4 -alkyl-1,2,3-triazol-1,4-diyl groups at 3'-O-position as well as the two products of copper-free alkyne-azide cycloaddition of the AZM derivative were prepared and evaluated against tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV). Four compounds (4, 6, 8a, 8b) showed EC 50  ≤ 10 nM, thus appearing the most potent TBEV inhibitors to date. Moreover, these nucleosides have higher lipophilicity (clogP) and increased solubility in aq. DMSO vs. parent compound dUY11., (Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.)

Most antivirals target viral proteins and are specific for only one virus, or viral type. Whereas viral proteins are encoded in the plastic viral genome, virion lipids are not and their rearrangements during fusion are conserved among otherwise unrelated enveloped viruses. Antivirals that inhibit these lipid rearrangements could thus pose a high barrier to resistance and have broad-spectrum activity. Fusion occurs through a hemifusion stalk in which only the outer leaflets are fused and thus curved with a smaller radius for the polar heads than for the hydrophobic tails (negative curvature). Outer leaflets enriched in phospholipids with head groups of larger cross sections than their lipid tails ("inverted cone") disfavor negative curvature, inhibiting fusion. The rigid amphipathic fusion inhibitors (RAFIs) are synthetic compounds of inverted cone molecular geometry. They inhibit infectivity of otherwise unrelated enveloped viruses. The leading RAFI, aUY11, has an ethynyl-perylene hydrophobic and an uracil-arabinose polar moiety. aUY11 intercalates in viral envelopes and inhibits virion-to-cell fusion of a broad spectrum of otherwise unrelated enveloped viruses. Previous studies showed that amphipathicity, rigidity, and inverted cone molecular geometry were required. We propose that the inverted cone molecular geometry of the RAFIs increases the energy barrier for the hemifusion stalk, inhibiting fusion. Then, chemically distinct compounds with similar amphipathicity, rigidity, and inverted cone shape would have similar antiviral potencies, regardless of specific chemical groups. Alternatively, the perylene group exposed to visible light may induce viral lipid peroxidation. Then, the perylene group and absorbance at visible spectrum would be required. We now evaluated twenty-five chemically distinct RAFIs. The perylene moiety and absorption at visible spectrum were not required, but a minimum length of the hydrophobic moiety was, 10.3 Å. The arabino moiety could be modified or replaced by other groups. Cytidine was not tolerated. Bilayer intercalation was required but not sufficient. The vast majority of RAFIs had no overt cytotoxicity (CC 50  > 20 μM; TI > 250-1200). Carbonyl or butylamide substitutions for arabino, or cytidine replacement for uracil, increased cytotoxicity. Cytotoxicity was mainly determined by the polar moiety and there was no correlation between antiviral and cytostatic activities. The definition of the effects of shape and chemical groups of the RAFIs opens the possibility to the rational design of lipid-acting antivirals active against a broad spectrum of enveloped viruses., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

1-Substituted 4-perylen-2(3)-yl-1,2,3-triazoles, easily accessible by 'click' reaction and combining in one molecule a polyaromatic unit and a nitrogen heterocycle, were found to strongly inhibit the reproduction of enveloped viruses. 5-[4-(Perylen-3-yl)-1,2,3-triazol-1-yl]-uridine and 2-[1-(2-hydroxyethyl)-1,2,3-triazol-4-yl]perylene show EC 50 of 0.031 and 0.023 μM, respectively, against tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV). Remarkably, the nucleoside unit appears to be not essential for antiviral activity. These results provide deeper understanding of structural basis of activity for this new class of antivirals., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.)

Perylene-based compounds are attracting significant attention due to their high broad-spectrum antiviral activity against enveloped viruses. Despite unambiguous results of in vitro studies and high selectivity index, the poor water solubility of these compounds prevented in vivo evaluation of their antiviral properties. In this work, we synthesized a series of compounds with a perylene pharmacophore bearing positively charged substituents to improve the aqueous solubility of this unique type of antivirals. Three types of charged groups were introduced: (1) quaternary morpholinium salts (3a–b); (2) a 2′-O-l-valinyl-uridine hydrochloride residue (8), and (3) a 3-methylbenzothiazolium cation (10). The synthesized compounds were evaluated based both on antiviral properties in vitro (CHIKV, SARS-CoV-2, and IAV) and on solubility in aqueous media. Compound 10 has the greatest aqueous solubility, making it preferable for pre-evaluation by intragastrical administration in a mouse model of lethal influenza pneumonia. The results indicate that the introduction of a positively charged group is a viable strategy for the design of drug candidates with a perylene scaffold for in vivo studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]