Electron Withdrawing Group Effect on Biological Activities of Pyrimidine Hybrids as Potential Anti-Matrix Metalloproteinase-7

Abstract

We investigated the effect of both electron donating group and e//lectron withdrawing group on biological activity of pyrimidine-based compounds as metalloproteinase-7 inhibitors and predicting a library of drug-like compounds with potent cytotoxicity using in silico approach. The selected compounds were optimized and subjected to both docking as well as absorption, distribution, metabolism, excretion and toxicity (ADMET) analyzes. We observed that the addition of electron withdrawing group (–CF3) to the predicted pyrimidine-based compound induced a radical improvement in the hydrogen bond strength with Leu181 and Ala182 in matrix metalloproteinase-7. Also, communal orientation of 2-mercapto-4-(3-(trifluoromethyl)phenyl)-6-((4-(trifluoromethyl)phenyl)amino) pyrimidine-5-carbonitrile (PC10) and matrix metalloproteinase-7 showed improved binding tendency with calculated binding affinity value of −10.2 kcal mol-1 than other studied compounds. Our findings may open door for the design and development of library of efficient pyrimidine-based drug-like compounds as potential anti-cancer agents.