Resveratrol - A comprehensive review of recent advances in anticancer drug design and development

Eur J Med Chem. 2020 Aug 15:200:112356. doi: 10.1016/j.ejmech.2020.112356. Epub 2020 May 19.

Abstract

Resveratrol is a natural polyphenolic stilbene isolated from various plants, foods and beverages with a broad spectrum of biological and pharmacological properties through modulating diverse targets and signaling pathways. Particularly, it has attracted a great deal of attention as a promising and multitarget anticancer agent due to its potential use in chemoprevention and chemotherapy of various tumors. However, unfavorable pharmacokinetics/pharmacodynamics profile such as poor bioavailability restricted its applications. Therefore, medicinal chemists have synthesized a lot of novel derivatives and analogues of resveratrol using different modification strategies to overcome these limitations and improve anticancer efficacy. Herein, we reviewed the design, synthesis, structure-activity relationship and mechanism of the most potent and privileged resveratrol-based compounds that showed promising anticancer activities in the last five years. We classified these compounds into the ten different categories based on their chemical structure similarities.

Keywords: Anticancer; Antitumor; Chemotherapy; Phytoalexin; Polyphenol; Resveratrol; Stilbenoid.

Publication types

  • Review

MeSH terms

  • Antineoplastic Agents / chemical synthesis*
  • Antineoplastic Agents / chemistry
  • Antineoplastic Agents / pharmacokinetics
  • Antineoplastic Agents / pharmacology
  • Antioxidants / chemical synthesis
  • Antioxidants / pharmacokinetics
  • Antioxidants / therapeutic use
  • Biological Availability
  • Drug Design*
  • Humans
  • Resveratrol / analogs & derivatives
  • Resveratrol / chemical synthesis
  • Resveratrol / pharmacokinetics
  • Resveratrol / therapeutic use*
  • Structure-Activity Relationship

Substances

  • Antineoplastic Agents
  • Antioxidants
  • Resveratrol