A practical strategy to develop isoform-selective near-infrared fluorescent probes for human cytochrome P450 enzymes
Lei Feng, Xiangge Tian, Dahong Yao, Zhenlong Yu, Xiaokui Huo, Zhenhao Tian, Jing Ning, Jingnan Cui, Tony D. James, Xiaochi Ma
Abstract
Currently, the development of selective fluorescent probes toward targeted enzymes is still a great challenge, due to the existence of numerous isoenzymes that share similar catalytic capacity. Herein, a double-filtering strategy was established to effectively develop isoenzyme-specific fluorescent probe(s) for cytochrome P450 (CYP) which are key enzymes involving in metabolism of endogenous substances and drugs. In the first-stage of our filtering approach, near-infrared (NIR) fluorophores with alkoxyl group were prepared for the screening of CYP-activated fluorescent substrates using a CYPs-dependent incubation system. In the second stage of our filtering approach, these candidates were further screened using reverse protein-ligand docking to effectively determine CYP isoenzyme-specific probe(s). Using our double-filtering approach, probes S9 and S10 were successfully developed for the real-time and selective detection of CYP2C9 and CYP2J2, respectively, to facilitate high-throughput screening and assessment of CYP2C9-mediated clinical drug interaction risks and CYP2J2-associated disease diagnosis. These observations suggest that our strategy could be used to develop the isoform-specific probes for CYPs.