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A potent antimalarial benzoxaborole targets a Plasmodium falciparum cleavage and polyadenylation specificity factor homologue.
Natural Sciences and Mathematics | Faculty Scholarship
  • Ebere Sonoiki, University of California, San Francisco
  • Caroline L. Ng, Columbia University Medical Center
  • Marcus C. S. Lee, Columbia University Medical Center
  • Denghui Guo, University of California, San Francisco
  • Yong-Kang Zhang, Anacor Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
  • Yasheen Zhou, Anacor Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
  • M. R. K. Alley, Anacor Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
  • Vida Ahyong, University of California, San Francisco
  • Laura M. Sanz, GlaxoSmithKline
  • Maria Jose Lafuente-Monasterio, GlaxoSmithKline
  • Chen Dong, Anacor Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
  • Patrick G Schupp, Columbia University Medical Center
  • Jiri Gut, University of California, San Francisco
  • Jenny Legac, University of California, San Francisco
  • Roland A. Cooper, Department of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, Dominican University of California
  • Francisco-Javier Gamo, GlaxoSmithKline
  • Joseph DeRisi, University of California, San Francisco
  • Yvonne R. Freund, Anacor Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
  • David A. Fidock, Columbia University Medical Center
  • Philip J. Rosenthal, University of California, San Francisco
Department
Natural Sciences and Mathematics
Document Type
Article
Source
Nature Communications
Publication Date
3-6-2017
Abstract

Benzoxaboroles are effective against bacterial, fungal and protozoan pathogens. We report potent activity of the benzoxaborole AN3661 against Plasmodium falciparum laboratory-adapted strains (mean IC50 32 nM), Ugandan field isolates (mean ex vivo IC50 64 nM), and murine P. berghei and P. falciparum infections (day 4 ED90 0.34 and 0.57 mg kg-1, respectively). Multiple P. falciparum lines selected in vitro for resistance to AN3661 harboured point mutations in pfcpsf3, which encodes a homologue of mammalian cleavage and polyadenylation specificity factor subunit 3 (CPSF-73 or CPSF3). CRISPR-Cas9-mediated introduction of pfcpsf3 mutations into parental lines recapitulated AN3661 resistance. PfCPSF3 homology models placed these mutations in the active site, where AN3661 is predicted to bind. Transcripts for three trophozoite-expressed genes were lost in AN3661-treated trophozoites, which was not observed in parasites selected or engineered for AN3661 resistance. Our results identify the pre-mRNA processing factor PfCPSF3 as a promising antimalarial drug target.

PubMed ID
28262680
Creative Commons License
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
Citation Information
Ebere Sonoiki, Caroline L. Ng, Marcus C. S. Lee, Denghui Guo, et al.. "A potent antimalarial benzoxaborole targets a Plasmodium falciparum cleavage and polyadenylation specificity factor homologue." Vol. 8 (2017) p. 14574 - 14574 ISSN: 2041-1723
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/roland_cooper/70/