Design, Synthesis and Anti Flaviviridae Activity of N⁶-, 5′,3′-O- and 5′,2′-O-Substituted Adenine Nucleoside Analogs

Abstract

During a random screening of representative libraries of nucleoside analogues we discovered that the adenine derivatives FEVB28 and FEG118 were Flaviviridae inhibitors endowed with potency comparable, if not superior, to that of ribavirin. Those studies prompted us to design a new class of protected nucleoside analogs, reported herein, which displays interesting anti-bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) activity and low cytotoxicity in cell-based assays (4, 23, 29 EC₅₀: 14, 11, 26 μM respectively, CC₅₀>100 μM) and appreciable activity in enzyme assays against the RNA dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) of BVDV (4, 23, 29, RdRp inhibition activity 27, 16, 15 μM respectively). A molecular modeling study was also carried out to highlight the possible interactions between this compounds class and the corresponding hepatitis C virus (HCV) enzyme.