Synthesis, molecular docking and preliminary anticancer activity of product-C as a hybrid compound against PI3K

The present work describes the synthesis, molecular docking, and preliminary anticancer evaluation of a hybrid compound, product- C composed of a fluorinated sulfur heterocyclic core and an adamantane moiety. The synthesis method was designed to tune the electronic, lipophilic and structural properties of the compound through the introduction of CF₃, F and Cl functional groups, which are well known for the improving metabolic stability, physicochemical properties and drug-likeness. The structure of the synthesized compound was confirmed by ¹ H and ¹³ C nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectra. Molecular docking against phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K), a protein target implicated in multiple cancers, showed that product- C exhibited a binding affinity of -10.6 kcal/mol, suggesting favorable interaction with the target. In parallel, the SRB (Sulforhodamine B) assay was used to evaluate the cytotoxicity of product- C toward PANC-1 cells. Preliminary results showed cell viabilities of 98.86% and 95.55% after exposure to 10 μM and 100 μM of product- C , respectively. These findings indicate that product- C displays low cytotoxicity toward PANC-1 cells under the tested conditions; however, they do not by themselves demonstrate marked antiproliferative activity.