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Discovery of novel androgen receptor inhibitors as prospective therapeutics for advanced prostate cancer

University of British Columbia

Prostate cancer (PCa) is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in men, and the second leading cause of male cancer death in North America. The androgen signalling pathway plays a central role in the development and advancement of PCa as well as in its progression to a lethal castration-resistant stage (CRPC). The human androgen receptor (AR) is a master regulator of PCa progression and survival, and a well-validated drug target for PCa. All clinically used AR inhibitors (antiandrogens) are initially effective to PCa; however, they invariably cause resistance. Thus, there is a continuing need for developing novel anti-AR drugs for the treatment of PCa and CRPC. Although the mechanism of resistance to antiandrogens is not completely clear, it involves mutation-driven antagonist-to-agonist transformation of the AR response, and the emergence of AR splice variants (ARVs) lacking the entire ligand-binding domain (LBD) of the protein. This dissertation describes the discovery and development of novel AR inhibitors directed towards the conventional androgen binding site (ABS) of the receptor, as well as the discovery of an entirely novel class of inhibitors targeting the DNA-binding domain (DBD) of the AR. Both types of AR inhibitors were identified through virtual screening and molecular modeling, followed by in vitro and/or in vivo validation of developed drug prototypes. The objective of developing novel chemotypes for ABS binders and AR DBD inhibitors is to help circumvent drug resistance problem in the field of PCa.

Text

2015-08-17

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 Canada

http://hdl.handle.net/2429/54470

Bioinformatics

University of British Columbia

UBCV

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/ca/