Antiproliferative and Antiangiogenic Properties of New VEGFR-2-targeting 2-thioxobenzo[]quinazoline Derivatives (In Vitro).

A series of 3-ethyl(methyl)-2-thioxo-2,3-dihydrobenzo[]quinazolines (-) were synthesized, characterized, and evaluated in vitro for their antiangiogenesis VEGFR-2-targeting, antiproliferative, and antiapoptotic activities against breast MCF-7 and liver HepG2 cells. Flow cytometry was used to determine cancer-cell cycle distributions, and apoptosis was detected using annexin-V-FITC (V) and propidium iodide (PI) dyes. Fluorescence microscopy, in combination with Hoechst staining was used to detect DNA fragmentation. Most of the tested benzo[]quinazolines demonstrated promising activity (IC = 8.8 ± 0.5-10.9 ± 0.9 μM) and (IC = 26.0 ± 2.5-40.4 ± 4.1 μM) against MCF-7 and HepG2, respectively. Doxorubicin was used as a reference drug. Compounds - showed the highest activity against both cancer cell lines. Differential effects were detected by cell-cycle analysis, indicating similarities in the actions of and against both MCF7 and HepG2, involving the targeting of G1 and S phases, respectively. Compound showed similar indices against both cells, indicating that its cytotoxicity toward the examined cancer cells could be unselective. Interestingly, and showed the highest apoptosis (30.76% and 25.30%, respectively) against MCF-7. The DNA fragmentation results agreed well with the apoptosis detected by flow cytometry. In terms of antiangiogenesis activity, as derived from VEGFR-2 inhibition, and were comparable to sorafenib and effected 1.5- and 1.4-fold inhibition relative to the standard sorafenib. A docking study was conducted to investigate the interaction between the synthesized benzo[]quinazolines and the ATP-binding site within the catalytic domain of VEGFR-2.