Synthesis, Biological Evaluation and Molecular Docking of Novel Curcumin Derivatives as Bcl‐2 Inhibitors Targeting Human Breast Cancer MCF‐7 Cells.

Abstract: An efficient one‐pot multicomponent double Michael addition strategy was developed for the synthesis of novel curcumin derivatives using 1,4‐diazabicyclo [2.2.2] octane (DABCO) as the catalyst. Selected compounds (E)‐4,4′′,5′‐trihydroxy‐6′‐(3‐(4‐hydroxy‐3‐methoxyphenyl)acryloyl)‐3,3′′‐dimethoxy‐3′,4′‐dihydro‐[1, 1′:3′, 1′′‐terphenyl]‐2′,2′(1′H)‐dicarbonitrile (4 k) and (E)‐ethyl 2′‐cyano‐4′′,5′‐dihydroxy‐6′‐(3‐(4‐hydroxy‐3‐methoxyphenyl)acryloyl)‐3′′‐methoxy‐4‐methyl‐1′,2′,3′,4′‐tetrahydro‐[1, 1′:3′, 1′′‐terphenyl]‐2′‐carboxylate (6 j) were evaluated for their in‐vitro anticancer activities against human breast cancer cells (MCF‐7) and human normal breast cells (HBL 100) and found to show effective cytotoxicity on MCF‐7 cells and less cytotoxicity on HBL 100 cells than simple curcumin. In addition, molecular docking studies helped to rationalize anti‐apoptotic Bcl‐2 binding of all the synthesized compounds and revealed that the docking of compounds 4 k and 6 j with Bcl‐2 was more potent compared to curcumin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]