An Atlas of the Human Kinome Reveals the Mutational Landscape Underlying Dysregulated Phosphorylation Cascades in Cancer.

Kinase inhibitors are used widely to treat various cancers, but adaptive reprogramming of kinase cascades and activation of feedback loop mechanisms often contribute to therapeutic resistance. Determining comprehensive, accurate maps of kinase circuits may therefore help elucidate mechanisms of response and resistance to kinase inhibitor therapies. In this study, we identified and validated phosphorylatable target sites across human cell and tissue types to generate PhosphoAtlas, a map of 1,733 functionally interconnected proteins comprising the human phospho-reactome. A systematic curation approach was used to distill protein phosphorylation data cross-referenced from 38 public resources. We demonstrated how a catalog of 2,617 stringently verified heptameric peptide regions at the catalytic interface of kinases and substrates could expose mutations that recurrently perturb specific phospho-hubs. In silico mapping of 2,896 nonsynonymous tumor variants identified from thousands of tumor tissues also revealed that normal and aberrant catalytic interactions co-occur frequently, showing how tumors systematically hijack, as well as spare, particular subnetworks. Overall, our work provides an important new resource for interrogating the human tumor kinome to strategically identify therapeutically actionable kinase networks that drive tumorigenesis. Cancer Res; 76(7); 1733-45. ©2016 AACR.

Does the combination of optimal substitutions at the C²-, N5- and N8-positions of the pyrazolo-triazolo-pyrimidine scaffold guarantee selective modulation of the human A3 adenosine receptors?

In an attempt to study the optimal combination of a phenyl ring at the C(2)-position and different substituents at the N(5)- and N(8)-positions towards the selective modulation of human A(3) adenosine receptors (hA(3)AR), we synthesized a new series of 2-para-(un)substituted-phenyl-pyrazolo-triazolo-pyrimidines bearing either a methyl or phenylethyl at N(8) and chains of variable length at N(5). Through biological evaluation, it was found that the majority of the compounds had good affinities towards the hA(3)AR in the low nanomolar range. Compound 16 possessed the best hA(3)AR affinity and selectivity profile (K(i)hA(3)=1.33 nM; hA(1)/hA(3)=4880; hA(2A)/hA(3)=1100) in the present series of 2-(substituted)phenyl-pyrazolo-triazolo-pyrimidine derivatives. In addition to pharmacological characterization, a molecular modeling investigation on these compounds further elucidated the effect of different substituents at the pyrazolo-triazolo-pyrimidine scaffold on affinity and selectivity to hA(3)AR.