Inducing apoptosis through upregulation of p53: structure–activity exploration of anthraquinone analogs

We previously reported a series of p53-elevating anthraquinone compounds with considerable cytotoxicity for acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) cells. To further develop this class of compounds, we examined the effect of a few key structural features on the anticancer structure–activity relationship (SAR) in ALL cells. The active analogs showed comparable cytotoxicity and upregulation of p53 but did not induce significant downregulation of MDM2 as seen with the lead compound AQ-101, indicating the importance of the anthraquinone core scaffold for MDM2 regulation. The result from the current study not only contributes to the SAR framework of these anthraquinone derivatives but also opens up new chemical space for further optimization work.