Previous studies on the natural product chlorofusin have shown that the full peptide and azaphilone structure are required for inhibition of the interaction between MDM2 and p53. In the current work, we utilized the cyclic peptide as a template and introduced an azidonorvaline amino acid in place of the ornithine/azaphilone of the natural product and carried out click chemistry with the resulting peptide. From this small library the first ever non-azaphilone containing chlorofusin analogue with MDM2/p53 activity was identified. Further studies then suggested that the simple structure of the Fmoc-norvaline amino acid that had undergone a click reaction was also able to inhibit MDM2/p53 interaction. This is an example where studies of a natural product have led to the serendipitous identification of a new small molecule inhibitor of a protein-protein interaction

Inhibitors of the p53-MDM2 protein-protein interaction are emerging as a new and validated approach to treating cancer. Herein, we describe the synthesis and inhibitory evaluation of a series of isoquinolin-1-one analogues, and highlight the utility of an initial growth-rates saturation-transfer difference (STD) NMR approach supported by protein-ligand docking to investigate p53-MDM2 inhibition. The approach is illustrated by the study of compound 1, providing key insights into the binding mode of this kind of MDM2 ligands and, more importantly, readily unveiling the previously proposed three-finger pharmacophore requirement for p53-MDM2 inhibition.