Novel semisynthetic spin-labeled derivatives of podophyllotoxin with cytotoxic and antioxidative activity.

A series of novel spin-labeled podophyllotoxin derivatives were synthesized by reacting the corresponding N-(1-oxyl-2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-4-piperidinyloxy carbonyl)-amino acids with 4beta-amino-4'-demethylepipodophyllotoxin. The synthesized derivatives 12a-g were evaluated for the partition coefficients, cytotoxicities in vitro against three tumor cell lines (A-549, HL-60, and RPMI-8226) and antioxidative activities in tissues of SD rats by the TBA method. The vast majority of target compounds have shown superior or comparable activities against A-549, HL-60, and RPMI-8226 compared to VP-16, and they have shown more significant antioxidative activities and superior water solubility than VP-16.