Mining Polo-Box domain of Polo-like kinase 1 as a new therapeutic target for cancer / 生物工程学报

Polo-like kinase 1 (Plk1) is widely regarded as one of the most promising targets for cancer therapy due to its essential role in cell division and tumor cell survival. At present, most Plk1 inhibitors have been developed based on kinase domain, some of which are in clinical trial. However, inhibitors targeting kinase domain face off-target effect and drug resistance owing to the conserved nature and the frequent mutations in the ATP-binding pocket. In addition to a highly conserved kinase domain, Plk1 also contains a unique Polo-Box domain (PBD), which is essential for Plk1's subcellular localization and mitotic functions. Inhibitors targeting Plk1 PBD show stronger selectivity and less drug resistance for cancer therapy. Therefore, Plk1 PBD is an attractive target for the development of anti-cancer agents. In this review, we will summarize the up-to date drug discovery for targeting Plk1 PBD, including the molecular structure and cellular functions of Plk1 PBD. Small-molecule inhibitors targeting Plk1 PBD not only provide an opportunity to specifically inhibit Plk1 activity for cancer treatment, but also unveil novel biological basis regarding the molecular recognition of Plk1 and its substrates.

Research progress of PoIo-Iike kinase 1 inhibitors targeting PoIo-box domain / 中国药科大学学报

The over-expression of Polo-like kinase 1(Plk1)is critical in the producing and progressing of multi-ple human tumors and is recognized as an effective target for the development of novel anti-cancer drugs.Currently a variety of small molecules targeting ATP or substrates binding sites have entered different stages of clinical trials.Polo-box domain(PBD)is a unique domain of Plks which plays an important role in the sub-cellular location of Plks and also in the recognition of their substrates,therefore it has become an attractive target for the development of novel target-directed Plk1 inhibitors.In this paper,PBD function of Plk1 was intro-duced,the progress of small molecule and phosphoserine /phosphothreonine contained short peptide Plk1 inhibi-tors targeting PBD was summarized.Further development of this kind of inhibitors was also proposed.