Cheng Long, Zhou Xiang, Huang Yan-Wei, Luo Rong-Shuang, Zeng Dan, Shao Wu-Bin, Zhang Heng, Liu Liwei, Wu Zhi-Bing, Yang Song
State Key Laboratory of Green Pesticides, Key Laboratory of Green Pesticide and Agricultural Bioengineering, Ministry of Education, Center for R&D of Fine Chemicals of Guizhou University, Guiyang, China.
Pest Manag Sci. 2025 Aug;81(8):4501-4514. doi: 10.1002/ps.8808. Epub 2025 Apr 2.
In recent years, many plant viral diseases have triggered global epidemics, posing an intractable threat to food safety and the global economy. However, antiviral agents currently remain insufficient due to their limited control effect and photothermal instability. Consequently, the development of antiviral alternatives with high efficiency and eco-friendly manifestation is a matter of great urgency and importance.
Herein, 34 purine nucleoside derivatives bearing a cinnamic acid building block were constructed and underwent evaluation of anti-tobacco mosaic virus (anti-TMV) potency. Biological assays demonstrated that compound A displayed excellent curative activity with a half maximal effective concentration (EC) of 274.25 mg L, which surpassed that of reference agents ribavirin (783.54 mg L) and ningnanmycin (283.26 mg L). The mechanism of action was further investigated through fluorescence confocal microscopy, reverse transcription quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR), TMV self-assembly, molecular docking, fluorescence titration, and transmission electron microscopy. Outcomes indicated that A could prevent the systemic transmission and biosynthesis of TMV in plants, in addition to blocking the self-assembly of TMV via interacting with TMV-coat protein.
Our research efforts resulted in the verification of compound A as novel antiviral agent alternative, which possessed the dual function of inhibiting the biosynthesis and self-assembly process of TMV, for effective controlling plant viral diseases. © 2025 Society of Chemical Industry.
