[Activity of a novel antitumor agent, TZT-1027]

We studied the antitumor activity of newly synthesized dolastatin 10 analogs. TZT-1027 showed remarkable activity and was selected for further development. TZT-1027 was found to inhibit the assembly of porcine brain microtubule proteins and to depolymerize the polymerized microtubule proteins. Therefore, its mechanism of antitumor activity seems to be at least partially ascribed to the inhibition of microtubule assembly. We further studied the binding site of TZT-1027 on tubulin. Scatchard analysis of 3H-TZT-1027 binding data suggested two binding sites including a high affinity site and a low affinity site. TZT-1027 affected the binding of vinblastine (VBL) on tubulin but its binding site isn't identical to the VBL binding site. TZT-1027 induced apoptosis within 24 h, not only in human leukemia cells such as HL-60, but also in solid tumors such as human prostate carcinoma cells DU145 and human mammary carcinoma cells MCF-7. TZT-1027 showed good antitumor activity against human xenografts (MX-1 and LX-1) without causing serious body weight reduction, which resulted in tumor regression. We examined the effect of TZT-1027 on the established tumor vasculature using the dye perfusion into tumor. TZT-1027 exhibited considerable antivascular activity in tumor sections in addition to excellent cytotoxic effect.