Le paludisme, maladie infectieuse due à des parasites du genre Plasmodium, reste mortel et préoccupant dans les régions intertropicales d’Afrique, d’Asie et d’Amérique. Les phénomènes de résistance des parasites aux différentes générations de traitements représentent un problème majeur, auxquels s’ajoutent le coût des traitements et donc l’accès aux soins pour les populations les plus défavorisées. Il est ainsi urgent de trouver de nouvelles cibles et de développer de nouveaux agents antipaludiques agissant via des mécanismes originaux. La cible étudiée lors de ces travaux de thèse est la leucyl aminopeptidase bimétallique de P. falciparum, notée PfA-M17. Elle a récemment émergé comme potentielle cible antipaludéenne et jouerait un rôle essentiel à la croissance et à la survie du parasite. Elle serait impliquée dans la dernière étape du catabolisme de l’hémoglobine lors du cycle érythrocytaire du parasite. Ces travaux se sont concentrés sur la conception, la synthèse et l’évaluation d’inhibiteurs sélectifs de PfA-M17. En s’inspirant de travaux antérieurs menés au laboratoire et d’expériences de modélisation moléculaire, des analogues benzocycloheptanes trisubstitués ont été conçus pour inhiber sélectivement PfA-M17. Une voie de synthèse diastéréosélective partant de l’acide D-isoascorbique a été mise au point et a permis d’accéder à des analogues cycloheptanes et cyclohexanes trisubstitués. Cette voie de synthèse a aussi été étudiée afin d’obtenir des analogues benzocycloheptanes trisubstitués. / Malaria is an infectious disease due to Plasmodium parasites, still causing numerous deaths in intertropical areas of Africa, America and Asia. Existing treatments face problems of high cost and resistance, hence the need to discover new targets and to develop new compounds. This work focused on a recent antimalarial target, a bimetallic leucyl aminopeptidase, named PfA-M17. Inhibition of this aminopeptidase shows it is essential for parasite survival and growth. PfA-M17 may be involved in the last step of hemoglobin digestion during the intraerythrocytic cycle of the parasite. This study concerned the design, the synthesis and the evaluation of selective PfA-M17 inhibitors. Trisubstituted benzocycloheptane analogs were designed as PfA-M17 inhibitors, based on previous works performed in our team and based on molecular modelling. A diastereoselective pathway was developed from D-isoascorbic acid and gave trisubstituted cycloheptanes and cyclohexanes analogs. This pathway was also studied in order to get the trisubstituted benzocycloheptane scaffolds.

To detect viral infections and tumors, CD8 T lymphocytes monitor cells for the presence of antigenic peptides bound to MHC class I molecules. The majority of MHC class I-presented peptides are generated from the cleavage of cellular and viral proteins by the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway. Many of the oligopeptides produced by this process are too long to stably bind to MHC class I molecules and require further trimming for presentation. Cytosolic aminopeptidases such as leucine aminopeptidase (LAP), which is IFN-inducible, Bleomycin Hydrolase (BH), and puromycin-sensitive aminopeptidase (PSA) can trim precursor peptides to mature epitopes and have been thought to play an important role in antigen presentation. To examine the role of these aminopeptidases in generating MHC class I peptides in vivo, we generated mice deficient in LAP or PSA, as well as cell lines deficient in LAP, PSA, or BH. LAP mutant mice and cells are viable and grow normally, whereas PSA mutant mice are smaller than their wild-type and heterozygote littermates, are subfertile as adults, and are subviable as embryos. The trimming of peptides in LAP-deficient cells is not reduced under basal conditions or after stimulation with IFN. Similarly, there is no reduction in presentation of peptides from precursor or full length antigen constructs or in the overall supply of peptides from cellular proteins to MHC class I molecules, even after stimulation with IFN. After viral infection, LAP-deficient mice generate normal CTL responses to seven epitopes from three different viruses. Similarly, PSA deficient mice and BH deficient mice generate normal CTL responses to viral epitopes. These data demonstrate that LAP, BH, and PSA are not essential enzymes for generating most MHC class I-presented peptides and reveal redundancy in the function of cellular aminopeptidases in most cell types.