Design and synthesis of novel tamoxifen analogues that avoid CYP2D6 metabolism

Tamoxifen (TAM) is a widely used drug in the prophylaxis and treatment of breast cancer. TAM is metabolized to the more active 4-hydroxytamoxifen (4-OH-TAM) and endoxifen by cytochrome P450 (CYP) mainly CYP2D6 and CYP3A4 enzymes. Due to the genetic polymorphisms in CYP2D6 genes, high variation in the clinical outcomes of TAM treatment is observed among women of different populations. To address this issue, novel TAM analogues with possible altered activation pathways were synthesized. These analogues were tested for their antiproliferative action on MCF-7 breast cancer cell lines as well as their binding affinity for estrogen receptor (ER) ER-α and ER-β receptors. These entire novel compounds showed better antiproliferative activity than did TAM on the MCF-7 cells. Moreover, compound 10 exhibited a half maximal growth inhibition (GI50) that was 1000 times more potent than that of TAM (GI50 < 0.005 μM vs 1.58 μM, respectively). Along with a broad spectrum activity on various cancer cell lines, all the TAM analogues showed considerable activity on the ER-negative breast cancer cell line. For further study, compound 10 was incubated in human liver microsomes (HLM), human hepatocytes (hHEP) and CYP2D6 supersomes. The active hydroxyl metabolite was detected after incubation in HLM and hHEP, implicating the involvement of other enzymes in its metabolism. These results prove that this novel series of TAM analogues might provide improved clinical outcomes for poor 2D6 metabolizers.