La prise en charge du cancer reste dépendante de l’utilisation des agents cytotoxiques, avec les analogues nucléosidiques. Au-delà de leur similarité structurelle, certains de ces composés partagent une voie métabolique commune, où la cytidine déaminase apparaît comme enzyme majeure. L’existence d’une variabilité génétique et/ou phénotypique de la CDA nous a mené à nous intéresser aux relations entre le statut CDA et l’issue clinique des patients afin de déterminer si la CDA pouvait être considérée comme biomarqueur d’issue clinique chez les patients.Nos travaux personnels ont consisté à évaluer deux techniques permettant de mesurer l’activité de la CDA. Nous avons publié le premier cas mondial de toxicités mortelles sous azacytidine chez un patient CDA-déficient, ainsi que le premier cas de déficience en CDA et de toxicités sous cytarabine causées par la présence d’une variation génétique du gène CDA chez une patiente transplantée hépatique. L’influence du statut CDA a également été étudiée chez deux patients traités par azacytidine. Concernant la gemcitabine, nous avons démontré l’impact délétère en terme d’efficacité de l’augmentation de l’activité CDA chez les patients, ainsi que les résultats d’une étude multicentrique prospective dont le but était de déterminer si la CDA pouvait être un marqueur prédictif de l’apparition des toxicités sous gemcitabine, avec une étude pharmacocinétique en support. Les travaux préliminaires du pyroséquençage partiel de la CDA sur technologie Roche® sont présentés. L’ensemble de ces travaux de thèse confirme l’intérêt d’évaluer le statut CDA chez les patients susceptibles de recevoir une thérapie à base d’analogues nucléosidiques. / Nowadays, the management of cancer pathology remains largely dependent on the use of cytotoxic agents, including nucleoside analogs, used in a variety of settings. Beyond their structural similarity, some of these compounds also share a common metabolic pathway, wherein the cytidine deaminase (CDA) plays a pivotal role. The existence of constitutional genetic and / or phenotypic variability in CDA prompted us to study the relationships between the CDA status and clinical outcome in patients, and to determine if the constitutional CDA could be considered as a biomarker of efficacy and toxicity in patients treated with this class of drugs.Our personal work first consisted in evaluating two methods to measure the CDA enzymatic activity, in terms of robustness and cost. Then we published the first case-report of life-threatening toxicities in a CDA-deficient patient treated with azacytidine, and the first case of CDA deficiency and cytarabine-caused toxicities correlated with presence of a genetic variation in CDA gene in a liver-transplant patient. The influence of CDA status was also assessed in two patients treated with azacytidine. Regarding gemcitabine, we present the impact of an increase in CDA activity on loss of efficacy in patients, and the results of a prospective multicenter study whose purpose was to determine whether the CDA could be a predictive marker of the occurrence of gemcitabine-toxicities, with a pharmacokinetic study support. Finally, preliminary data on partial Roche®-pyrosequencing of CDA, also presented.All these thesis work confirms the interest to evaluate the CDA status in patients likely to receive a nucleosidic analogues-based therapy.

Taxol™, isolated from the bark of Taxus brevifolia in the late 1960s, and the semisynthetic analog Taxotere™ have proven clinical importance for the treatment of ovarian and breast cancer. Taxol™ exerts its biological effect by binding to polymerized tubulin and stabilizing the resulting microtubules. Studies aimed at understanding the biologically active conformation of taxol and its binding environment on β-tubulin are described. This knowledge is important because it could lead to the design of structurally less complicated drugs with better efficacy and better bioavailability. Moreover, the information can be extended to other natural products that possess microtubule-stabilizing properties similar to Taxol™. In this work, the synthesis of a triply labeled taxol analog is described as well as REDOR studies of this compound complexed to tubulin are in progress. Macrocyclic analogs of taxol have been prepared and their biological activities were evaluated. Chemical modeling of these analogs and their activities agrees with the hypothesis that Taxol™ adopts T-shaped conformation. Difficulties were encountered with the key ring-closing metathesis strategy, suggesting that a more flexible and efficient macrocyclization method will be needed to synthesize additional macrocyclic analogs. / Ph. D.

La compréhension et l'exploitation des processus biologiques, tels que la symbiose fixatrice d'azote (plante-bactéries) et la symbiose endomycorhizienne à arbuscules (plante-champignons), représentent un intérêt agronomique et écologique majeur. Les lipo-chitooligosaccharides (LCO) jouent un rôle essentiel dans la mise en place de ces deux symbioses. Il est donc important de mieux comprendre les mécanismes induits par ces molécules signal, et notamment l’interaction avec leur récepteur dans les plantes-hôtes.Les synthèses chimiques de ces molécules sont souvent longues, difficiles et les rendements finaux sont très faibles. Il est intéressant de s'intéresser à l'obtention d'analogues biologiquement actifs dont la synthèse serait plus efficace. Différents travaux ont montré qu'un cycle triazole pouvait être un bon mime d'une unité saccharidique. De plus, des travaux de modélisation des interactions protéine-ligand ont permis de supposer que l'unité II d'un LCO-IV pourrait avoir un rôle moins important dans la liaison avec le récepteur. Le but du projet a donc été de réaliser la synthèse de ces analogues de LCO-IV dont l'unité II est remplacée par un lien triazole.La stratégie développée a nécessité la synthèse de deux briques moléculaires, un monosaccharide propargylé en position 4 et un disaccharide comportant un azoture en position anomère. Grâce à la mise au point des différentes étapes de synthèse, ces deux briques ont pu être obtenues avec de bons rendements. La cycloaddition [3+2] catalysée au cuivre a permis d'obtenir le triazole souhaité et les premiers analogues de tétrasaccharides de manière efficace. L'utilisation préalable de protections adéquates a permis d'introduire la diversité moléculaire souhaitée, une fonction sulfate sur la position 6 de l'unité réductrice et différentes chaînes carbonées lipophiles sur l'amine de l'unité non-réductrice. Quatre analogues de LCO ont été obtenus avec de très bons rendements. Les tests de compétitions, effectués sur ces analogues, n'ont montré aucune affinité pour le récepteur. Une approche synthétique de nouveaux analogues par une C-glycosylation a alors été proposée. / Understanding and exploitation of biological processes, such as symbiotic nitrogen fixation (plant-bacteria) and arbuscular endomycorrhizal symbiosis (plant-fungi), represent important agricultural, ecological and societal interest. The lipo-chitooligosaccharides (LCO) play an essential role in the implementation of these symbioses, it is then important to better understand the mechanisms induced by these signaling molecules, and especially the interaction with host-plant receptors.The chemical syntheses of these molecules are often long, difficult and the final yields are very low, so it could be interesting to obtain biological active analogs more efficiently. Various studies have already shown that a triazole unit could be a saccharide mimic. Furthermore, modelling studies of protein-ligand interactions showed that the monosaccharidic unit II of a LCO-IV could have a less important role in the interaction with the receptor. The project aimed to synthesize these LCO-IV analogs in which unit II was replaced by a triazole link.The strategy was directed towards the synthesis of two glycostructures, a monosaccharide propargylated at C-4 position and a disaccharide with an azide at anomeric position. Various synthetic steps were performed to have access to these two intermediates in good yields. Copper-catalyzed [3+2] cycloaddition gave efficiently the desired triazole unit of tetrasaccharidic analogs. The prior use of adequate protections finally allowed to introduce the desired molecular diversity, a sulphate function at C-6 position of the reducing unit and different lipophilic carbon chains on the amine of the non-reducing unit, and thus to obtain four LCO analogs with very good yields. Competition tests performed on these analogs have shown no affinity for the receptor. A synthetic approach of novel analogs using a C-glycosylation step was then proposed.

The misassembly of soluble proteins into toxic aggregates, including amyloid fibrils, underlies a large number of human degenerative diseases. Cardiac amyloidosis, which is most commonly, caused by aggregation of Immunoglobulin (Ig) light chains or transthyretin (TTR) in the cardiac muscle, represent an important and often underdiagnosed cause of heart failure. TTR-mediated amyloid cardiomyopathies are chronic and progressive conditions that lead to arrhythmias, biventricular heart failure, and death. As no Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs are currently available for treatment of these diseases, the development of therapeutic agents that prevent TTR-mediated cardiotoxicity is desired. AG10 is a potent and selective kinetic stabilizer of TTR. AG10 prevents dissociation of TTR in serum samples obtained from patients with amyloid cardiomyopathy. The oral bioavailability and selectivity of AG10, makes it a very promising candidate to treat TTR amyloid cardiomyopathy. Understanding the reason behind the potency of AG10 would be beneficial for designing stabilizers for other amyloid diseases. This would be possible by designing and synthesizing structural analogues of AG10. Here we report the synthesis, characterization and analysis of AG10 analogs and the comparison of the in vitro activities of the synthesized analogs. The tremendous therapeutic potential of peptides has not been fulfilled and potential peptide therapies that have failed far outnumber the successes so far. A major challenge impeding the more widespread use of peptides as therapeutics is their poor pharmacokinetic profile, due to short In vivo half-life resulting from inactivation by serum proteases and rapid elimination by kidneys. Extending the In vivo half-life of peptides is clearly desirable in order for their therapeutic potential to be realized, without the need for high doses and/or frequent administration. Covalent conjugation of peptides to macromolecules (e.g. polyethylene glycol or serum proteins such albumin) has been the mainstay approach for enhancing the In vivo half-life of peptides. However, the steric hindrance and immunogenicity of these large macromolecules often compromises the In vivo efficacy of the peptides. Recently, our laboratory established the first successful reversible method of extending the half-life of peptides using serum protein TTR. The approach involved the use of a TTR Ligand for Half-life Extension (TLHE-1) which binds to TTR with high specificity and affinity. We have shown that our technology extends the half-life of multiple peptides without seriously affecting their activity. Our main objective here is to modify the structure of TLHE1 using linkers with different length and composition to optimize its affinity and selectivity for TTR in human serum.

No description available.

Photoinduced electron transfer (PET) plays a crucial role in a wide array of biological pathways. These electron transfer reactions happen from or to the excited state of a chromophore upon absorption of light. Hence understanding the properties of excited states is necessary in elucidating the details of such pathways. The work presented in this thesis deals with PET in two systems: Fluorescent Nucleobase Analogues (FBAs) and DNA photolyase. The introductory chapter (Chapter 1) presents some background information about the two systems and sets up the stage for the reasoning behind the problems addressed in this thesis. FBAs are fluorescent analogues of naturally occurring, weakly fluorescent native nucleic acid bases. When incorporated into single stranded (ss) or double stranded (ds) DNA, the FBA fluorescence is significantly quenched. PET has been implicated to be the cause for the observed quenching. Here we have presented our attempt to correlate the quenching behavior of free FBA: nucleic acid monophosphate (NMP) pairs with the free energies associated with excited state electron transfer delta GET. Based on the delta GET values, we have tried to assign the direction of electron transfer. The quenching behavior of the FBA:NMP pairs were studied through Stern-Volmer (SV) quenching and time-resolved fluorescence studies. The above described analysis has been applied on FBAs: 4-amino-6-methyl-8-(2'-deoxy-beta-D-ribofuranosyl)-7(8H)-pteridone (6MAP), 4-amino - 2, 6 - dimethyl - 8 - (2'-deoxy-beta-d-ribofuranosyl) -7(8H) - pteridone (DMAP), 3-methyl-8-(2'-deoxy-beta-D-ribofuranosyl) isoxanthopterin (3MI) and 6-Methyl-8-(2'-deoxy-β-D-ribofuranosyl) isoxanthopterin (6MI) (Chapter 3), 2-Aminopurine (2AP) (Chapter 4), 8-Vinyl Adenosine (8VA) (Chapter 5). The final part of this thesis (Chapter 6) is on understanding the mechanistic details of a DNA repair process that is due to photoinduced electron transfer in DNA photolyase, a flavoprotein. Before the electron reaches the damaged site in the DNA, the initial electron acceptor in this repair process has been speculated to be the adenine of the flavin adenine dinucleotide (FAD). We have tested this hypothesis by measuring and comparing the various kinetic parameters associated with this process by reconstituting into apo-photolyase the natural cofactor of photolyase (FAD) and an adenine modified flavin (Etheno FAD, epsilon FAD). / Chemistry

No / With increasing interest in hot melt extrusion for preparing polymer-drug systems, knowledge of the shear and extensional rheology of polymers is required for the formulation and process design. Shear and extensional rheology of three commercial grades of hydroxypropyl cellulose (HPC) was examined at 140, 145 and 150 degrees C using twin bore capillary rheometry at range of processing rates. The power law model fitted for shear flow behaviour up to shear strain rates of approximately 1000s(-1), above which measured shear viscosities deviated from the power law and surface instabilities were observed in the extrudate, particularly for higher molecular weight grades. Shear thinning index was found to be relatively independent of temperature and molecular weight, whilst the consistency index, indicative of zero shear viscosity increased exponentially with increase in molecular weight. Extensional viscosity of all grades studied was found to decrease with increasing temperature and increasing processing rate. Foaming of the extrudate occurred especially at low temperatures and with the high molecular weight grade. An understanding of the relationships between shear and extensional flows with temperature, processing rate and molecular weight is a useful tool for process design; optimisation and troubleshooting of Hot melt extrusion (HME) of pharmaceutical formulations.

Les virus de l'Immunodéficience Humaine de type 1 et 2 (HIV-1 et HIV-2) et de l'Hépatite B (HBV) représentent un intérêt particulier en santé publique. En effet, on estime à plus de 33 millions le nombre de personnes infectées par le virus HIV dans le monde et 360 millions par HBV. La transcriptase inverse (RT) est une enzyme nécessaire à leur réplication et constitue donc une cible majeure des drogues antivirales. Parmi les NRTI commercialisés, les analogues de nucleotides de type phosphonates acyclique, comme l'Adefovir (HEPSERA®, Gilead) et le Tenofovir (VIREAD®, Gilead) sous forme prodrogue, ont révolutionné les traitements contre les virus HBV et HIV. Devant l'emmergence de virus résistants, il est urgent de développer de nouveaux antiviraux plus puissants et surtout actifs sur ces souches afin d'optimiser les multithérapies antivirales. Dans ce but, nous avons conçu des analogues thiophosphonates dérivés de l'Adefovir (PMEA) et du Tenofovir (PMPA), non toxiques pour la cellules et actifs contre HIV-1, HIV-2 et HBV en culture de cellules infectées. Ces composés, baptisés Adethiovir et Tenothiovir, ont été synthétisés selon une méthode originale et ont fait l'objet d'un dépôt de brevet. Nous avons synthétisé les formes diphosphates correspondantes : incorporés par la RT, terminateurs de chaîne, ils contournent la résistance associée au mutant K65R. Notre objectif est donc de les pousser plus loin dans le « pipe-line » du développement de médicaments antiviraux. / The Human Immunodeficiency Virus type 1 and type 2 (HIV-1 and HIV-2) and Hepatitis B (HBV) constitue a special interest in public health. Indeed, it is estimated that more than 33 million people infected with HIV worldwide and 360 million with HBV. Reverse transcriptase (RT) is an enzyme required for their replication and is therefore a key target for antiviral drugs. Among the NRTI marketed, nucleotide analogues like acyclic phosphonates, such as adefovir (Hepsera ®, Gilead) and Tenofovir (VIREAD ®, Gilead) as a prodrug form, have revolutionized the treatment against HBV and HIV. With the emmergence of resistant virus, there is a need to develop new antiviral compounds that are targetting especially these to optimize antiviral combination therapies. For this purpose, we designed analogues thiophosphonates derivatives Adefovir (PMEA) and tenofovir (PMPA), that are non-toxic in cells and active against HIV-1, HBV and HIV-2 infected cell cultures. These compounds, named Adethiovir Tenothiovir, were synthesized according to an original method and were the subject of a patent. We synthesized the corresponding diphosphates forms: incorporated by RT, chain terminators, they bypass the resistance associated with the K65R mutant. Our goal is to push them further in the "pipeline" development of antiviral drugs.

Ce travail porte sur le comportement sous irradiation d’une vitrocéramique élaborée par traitement thermique d’une version riche en molybdène du verre de confinement de déchets nucléaires R7/T7 et plus particulièrement de la phase cristalline. Des terres rares (Nd3+ et Eu3+) sont utilisées à la fois comme simulants des produits de fission et des actinides mineurs et comme sondes structurales luminescentes. La phase cristalline présente dans ce type de vitrocéramique est un molybdate de calcium de type powellite CaMoO4 ayant incorporé divers éléments dont des terres rares. Les propriétés cristallochimiques de la phase powellite ont été étudiées notamment par spectroscopie Raman et photoluminescence grâce à divers échantillons naturels et céramiques de compositions allant de CaMoO4 à une modèle proche de celle des cristaux de la vitrocéramique : Ca0,76Sr0,1Na0,07Eu0,01La0,02Nd0,02Pr0,02MoO4. La largeur à mi-hauteur de la bande Raman à 880 cm-1 augmente linéairement en fonction du taux d’incorporation sur le site calcium, incorporation qui influe également sur les paramètres de maille. Le volume intrinsèque de la maille augmente ainsi de 2 %. L’étude d’analogues naturels contenant de l’uranium ainsi que de céramiques et vitrocéramiques irradiées aux ions hélium, argon et plomb a permis de montrer que la structure powellite était très résistante aux dégâts causés. Sous irradiation, le signal de luminescence de Eu3+ des différents échantillons tend à s’uniformiser. Cette uniformisation du signal se retrouve également en spectroscopie Raman. Alors qu’elle peut varier entre 6 et 12 cm-1 pour des céramiques saines, la largeur à mi-hauteur de la bande Raman à 880 cm-1 devient identique, de l’ordre de 18 cm-1, à partir de 10 dpa. Le désordre créé par les irradiations prend le pas sur celui créé par l’incorporation d’éléments dans la structure. Cependant, la spectroscopie Raman et la diffraction des rayons X montre que la structure reste cristalline, au moins partiellement. Sous irradiations, le gonflement de la powellite est en moyenne de 5 % mais est très hétérogène. / This work deals with the behaviour under irradiation of a glass-ceramic made after heat treatment of a molybdenum rich R7/T7 type glass. Rare earth elements (Eu3+ and Nd3+) are used as surrogates of minor actinides and fission products as well as structural luminescent probes. We will focus on the behaviour of the crystalline phase which is a powellite type calcium molybdate that incorporated other elements including rare earth elements. In order to determine the crystalline-chemical properties of the powellite structure, Raman spectroscopy and photoluminescence analyses are led on natural powellite samples and synthetic ceramics with compositions from pure CaMoO4 to Ca0.76Sr0.1Na0.07Eu0.01La0.02Nd0.02Pr0.02MoO4, a model composition of the crystalline phase of the glass-ceramic. The analyses of synthetic samples irradiated with He, Ar and Pb ions compared to the behaviour of a natural powellite sample that contains uranium indicate that powellite resist strongly to irradiation and never reach the amorphous state.

A Aspergilose Broncopulmonar alérgica (ABPA) é uma doença complexa,desencadeada por uma reação de hipersensibilidade ao Aspergillus fumigatus, que apresenta vários estágios, sendo que no estágio mais grave, os pacientes apresentam bronquiectasias. O diagnóstico da doença é difícil e o maior problema é a falta de antígenos padronizados necessários para a determinação de anticorpos específicos. O objetivo do presente estudo é avaliar se os testes cutâneos com os análogos de Asp f 1 podem auxiliar no diagnóstico e no estadiamento da ABPA. Três grupos de pacientes classificados por testes sorológicos foram obtidos a saber 20 ABPA (16BQ+; 4BQ-), 25 possíveis -ABPA (14BQ+;11BQ-) e 24 asmáticos sem ABPA (11BQ+;13BQ-). Fizeram parte do estudo 10 pessoas sem asma . Todos foram submetidos a testes intradérmicos com três antígenos a-sarcina, mitogilina e estrictocina.Houve uma intensa reação a todos os antígenos e as reações produzidas foram semelhantes para os três antígenos. As reações de leitura tardia positivas à mitogilina foram biopsiadas. As biopsias de 2 (12,5%) dos pacientes BQ+ do grupo ABPA e 5 do grupo ABPA possível com BQ+ (35,6%) mostraram vasculite por depósito de imunocomplexos. 11 pacientes do terceiro grupo não apresentaram vasculite. O quarto grupo não apresentou reação tardia. Todos os pacientes com reação positiva apresentaram BQ+. alfa-sarcina, a mitogilina e a restrictocina diferenciaram pacientes com ABPA por testes intradérmicos e podem ser aplicados no diagnóstico da doença. A maior incidência de bronquiectasias foi encontrada no primeiro grupo (80%) e no segundo (56%). No terceiro grupo nenhum caso foi encontrado em 23 pacientes com asma e teste ID positivo ao aspergillus fumigatus todos os pacientes com vasculite tinham bronquiectasia. Há possibilidade de que as lesões produzidas nos pulmões sejam produzidas por vasculite. / Allergic Bronchopulmonary Aspergillosis (ABPA) is a complex disease, triggered by a hypersensitivity reaction to Aspergillus fumigatus. The disease diagnosis is difficult, and a major problem is the lack of standardized allergens for the determination of specific antibodies. The aim of the present study is to evaluate if intradermal (ID) tests with analogs of Asp f 1 can aid in the diagnosis and stage assessment of abpa. Three groups of patients classified by serological tests were obtained. 20 ABPA (16BQ+; 4BQ-), 25 possible-ABPA (14BQ+; 11BQ-), 24 asthmatic-ABPAfree (11BQ+; 13BQ-) and 10 asthma-free people were submitted to id tests with three antigens: mitogillin, a-sarcin and restrictocin. There was intense reaction to all three antigens and the response was similar. The positive reactions to mitogillin were biopsied. The skin biopsies of two (12,5%) bq+ patients of the first group and 5 BQ+ (35,6%) patients of the second one showed vasculitis by immune complexes (IC) deposition. 11 patients of the third group had negative biopsies. The fourth group didn\'t have late-reaction. All patients with positive reaction were BQ+. By ID test, alfa-sarcin, mitogillin and restrictocin could differentiate patients with abpa and can be applicable in disease diagnosis. The higher incidence of bronchiectasis was found in the first (80%) and second (56%) groups. In the third group, IC wasn\'t found in 23 asthma patients and id test was positive to A. fumigatus. All patients with vasculitis by IC had bronchiectasis. Therefore, the results indicate that this kind of pulmonary lesion is caused by vasculitis.