Synthesis and lanthanum coordination of a BzMacropa analogue for convenient solid-phase peptide synthesis towards...

The alpha-emitting isotope actinium-225 is a promising radiometal for developing targeted alpha therapeutics (TAT) to treat malignant diseases. Actinium-225 has a half-life of 9.92 days and a decay chain emitting four alpha-particles. Alpha particle therapeutics are particularly attractive for their precise treatment while sparing surrounding tissue. Effective application of actinium-225 in radiopharmaceutical design requires a chelator that stably coordinates the metal and enables bioconjugation to targeting vectors. BzMacropa, a benzyl-fused diaza-18-crown-6 macrocyclic ligand, exhibits favorable binding properties but is incompatible with peptide-based radiopharmaceuticals synthesized using solid-phase peptide synthesis (SPPS) due to undesirable side reactions such as dimerization, offering limited conjugation flexibility. We report a synthetic route to a protected analogue of BzMacropa integrated with protected tert-butyl ester picolinic acid pendant arms with a free carboxylic acid handle enabling flexible conjugation strategies. The protected chelator was successfully synthesized at the multigram scale and was coupled to the C-X-C chemokine type 4 (CXCR4)-targeting peptide FC122 under SPPS conditions. The resulting conjugate was complexed with lanthanum (III), a non-radioactive surrogate for actinium-225. This work demonstrates a high-yielding, scalable synthesis and a modular platform for developing BzMacropa-peptide conjugates, providing an effective approach to the synthesis of next-generation peptide-based TAT radiopharmaceuticals.