posted on 2016-12-01, 00:00authored byManuela Jörg, Alisa Glukhova, Alaa Abdul-Ridha, Elizabeth A. Vecchio, Anh T. N. Nguyen, Patrick M. Sexton, Paul J. White, Lauren T. May, Arthur Christopoulos, Peter J. Scammells
The A1 adenosine receptor (A1AR) is an important
G protein-coupled receptor that regulates a range of physiological
functions. Herein we report the discovery of novel irreversible agonists
acting at the A1AR, which have the potential to serve as
useful research tools for studying receptor structure and function.
A series of novel adenosine derivatives bearing electrophilic substituents
was synthesized, and four compounds, 8b, 15a, 15b, and 15d, were shown to possess similar
potency and efficacy to the reference high efficacy agonist, NECA,
in an assay of ERK1/2 phosphorylation assay. Insensitivity to antagonist
addition in a real-time, label-free, xCELLigence assay was subsequently
used to identify compounds that likely mediated their agonism through
an irreversible interaction with the A1AR. Of these compounds, 15b and 15d were more directly validated as irreversible
agonists of the A1AR using membrane-based [3H]DPCPX and [35S]GTPγS binding experiments.