A skeletally diverse library of bioactive natural-product-like compounds enabled by late-stage P450-catalyzed oxyfunctionalization

Abstract

Natural products have historically represented a major source of therapeutics and small-molecule probes for interrogating biological systems. Here, we describe the design and implementation of P450-mediated chemoenzymatic diversity-oriented synthesis (CeDOS), a strategy in which selective, regiodivergent P450-catalyzed oxyfunctionalizations are leveraged as key steps for enabling the skeletal rearrangement and diversification of a parent compound. Using this strategy and plant-derived parthenolide as the parent molecule, a structurally diverse library of over 50 unprecedented natural-product-like scaffolds was generated via divergent chemoenzymatic routes. Importantly, several members of this CeDOS library were found to exhibit notable cytotoxicity against human cancer cells as well as diversified anticancer activity profiles. This work demonstrates the power of CeDOS as a strategy for directing the construction and discovery of novel bioactive molecules, and it offers a blueprint for the broader application of this approach toward the creation and exploration of natural-product-like chemical libraries.