Effects of PI3K and FGFR inhibitors alone and in combination, and with/without cytostatics in childhood neuroblastoma cell lines.

Neuroblastoma (NB) is a heterogenous disease with treatment varying from observation for low‑risk tumors, to extensive therapy with chemotherapy, surgery, radiotherapy, and autologous bone‑marrow‑transplantation and immunotherapy. However, a high frequency of primary‑chemo‑refractory disease and recurrences urgently require novel treatment strategies. The present study therefore investigated the anti‑NB efficacy of the recently FDA‑approved phosphoinositide 3‑kinase (PI3K) and fibroblast growth factor receptor (FGFR) inhibitors, alpelisib (BYL719) and erdafitinib (JNJ‑42756493), alone and in combination with or without cisplatin, vincristine, or doxorubicin on 5 NB cell lines.

A simple open source bioinformatic methodology for initial exploration of GPCR ligands' agonistic/antagonistic properties.

Drug development is an arduous procedure, necessitating testing the interaction of a large number of potential candidates with potential interacting (macro)molecules. Therefore, any method which could provide an initial screening of potential candidate drugs might be of interest for the acceleration of the procedure, by highlighting interesting compounds, prior to in vitro and in vivo validation. In this line, we present a method which may identify potential hits, with agonistic and/or antagonistic properties on GPCR receptors, integrating the knowledge on signaling events triggered by receptor activation (GPCRs binding to G proteins, and activating G , exchanging GDP for GTP, leading to a decreased affinity of the G for the GPCR).