Rational Design of Photochromic Analogues of Tricyclic Drugs.

Tricyclic chemical structures are the core of many important drugs targeting all neurotransmitter pathways. These medicines enable effective therapies to treat from peptic ulcer disease to psychiatric disorders. However, when administered systemically, they cause serious adverse effects that limit their use. To obtain localized and on-demand pharmacological action using light, we have designed photoisomerizable ligands based on azobenzene that mimic the tricyclic chemical structure and display reversibly controlled activity. Pseudo-analogues of the tricyclic antagonist pirenzepine demonstrate that this is an effective strategy in muscarinic acetylcholine receptors, showing stronger inhibition upon illumination both in vitro and in cardiac atria ex vivo. Despite the applied chemical modifications to make pirenzepine derivatives sensitive to light stimuli, the most potent candidate of the set, cryptozepine-2, maintained a moderate but promising M1 vs M2 subtype selectivity. These photoswitchable "crypto-azologs" of tricyclic drugs might open a general way to spatiotemporally target their therapeutic action while reducing their systemic toxicity and adverse effects.

Adrenergic Modulation With Photochromic Ligands.

Adrenoceptors are ubiquitous and mediate important autonomic functions as well as modulating arousal, cognition, and pain on a central level. Understanding these physiological processes and their underlying neural circuits requires manipulating adrenergic neurotransmission with high spatio-temporal precision. Here we present a first generation of photochromic ligands (adrenoswitches) obtained via azologization of a class of cyclic amidines related to the known ligand clonidine. Their pharmacology, photochromism, bioavailability, and lack of toxicity allow for broad biological applications, as demonstrated by controlling locomotion in zebrafish and pupillary responses in mice.