Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
1377586 | Bioorganic & Medicinal Chemistry Letters | 2007 | 4 Pages |
A regiochemical and stereochemical mixture of flexible linkers bearing terminal azide functionality was synthesized in two steps from squalene and was used to connect two high affinity NDP-α-MSH ligands or two low affinity MSH(4) ligands. The ligands were N-terminally acylated using N-hydroxysuccinimidoyl 5-hexynoate and were subsequently attached to the linker via copper-catalyzed ‘click’ 3 + 2 cyclization of the azide and alkyne moieties. In vitro biological evaluations showed that the binding affinity to the human melanocortin 4 receptor was not diminished for most linker-ligand combinations relative to the corresponding parental ligand. Statistical and cooperative binding effects were observed for dimeric constructs containing the low affinity ligand MSH(4), but not for dimeric NDP-α-MSH constructs, presumably due to slow off rates for this high affinity ligand.
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