Dysoxylactam A: A Macrocyclolipopeptide Reverses P-Glycoprotein-Mediated Multidrug Resistance in Cancer Cells

A 17-membered macrocyclolipopeptide, named dysoxylactam A (1) comprising an unprecedented branched C19 fatty acid and an l-valine, was isolated from the plants of Dysoxylum hongkongense. The challenging relative configuration of 1 was established by means of residual dipolar coupling-based NMR analysis. The absolute configuration of 1 was determined by single-crystal X-ray diffraction on its p-bromobenzoate derivative (2). Compound 1 dramatically reversed multidrug resistance in cancer cells with the fold-reversals ranging from 28.4 to 1039.7 at the noncytotoxic concentration of 10 μM. The mode-of-action study of 1 revealed that it inhibited the function of P-glycoprotein (P-gp), a key mediator in multidrug resistance.