Selective bone targeting 5-fluorouracil prodrugs: Synthesis and preliminary biological evaluation

Bone tumor is a notoriously difficult disease to manage, requiring frequent and heavy doses of systemically administered chemotherapy. Targeting anticancer drug to the bone after systemic administration may provide both greater efficacy of treatment and less frequent administration. In this paper, a series of bone targeting Asp oligopeptides 5-fluorouracil conjugates have been synthesized in a convergent approach and well characterized by NMR and MS techniques. Their hydroxyapatite (HAP) affinity, drug release and cytotoxicity characteristics were evaluated in in vitro conditions. All the prodrugs were water soluble and exhibited high affinity to HAP. The efficient release of the active drug moiety occurring by the cleavage of different linkage in physiological conditions significantly reduced the number of viable human cancer cells. From in vivo distribution, we get these compounds with high bone-selectivity and long halflife. These results provided an effective entry to the development of new bone targeting chemotherapeutic drugs. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.