Novel triazoloquinazolines were designed and synthesized and evaluated as anticancer agents against HepG2 and HCT-116 cells. The biological testing data corresponded well to those of the molecular docking studies. The HCT-116 cell line was most affected due to the actions of our derivatives. Derivative 7a was the most potent one against both HepG2 and HCT116 cells, with IC50 = 7.98 and 5.57 µM, respectively. This compound showed anticancer activity that was nearly equipotent to that of doxorubicin against HepG2 cells, but higher than that of doxorubicin against HCT116 cells (IC50 = 7.94 and 8.07 µM, respectively). Compounds 8, 7b , and 6f showed excellent anticancer activities against both the HCT116 and HepG2 cell lines. The highly active compounds 6f , 7a , 7b , and 8 were evaluated for their DNA-binding activities. Compounds 7a and 8 showed the highest binding activities. These derivatives potently intercalate in DNA, at IC50 values of 42.90 and 48.13 µM, respectively. Derivatives 6f and 7b showed good DNA-binding activities, with IC50 values of 54.24 and 50.56 µM, respectively. Furthermore, in silico calculated ADMET profiles were established for our four highly active derivatives, in comparison to doxorubicin. Our derivatives 6f , 7a , 7b , and 8 showed a very good ADMET profile. Compounds 6f , 7a , 7b , and 8 follow Lipinski's rules, while doxorubicin violates three of these rules.
Keywords: DNA intercalators; [1,2,4]triazolo[4,3-c]quinazoline; anticancer agents; molecular docking.
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