Mechanisms of Osteoclastogenesis Inhibition by a Novel Class of Biphenyl-Type Cannabinoid CB2 Receptor Inverse Agonists

Wolfgang Schuehly, Juan Manuel Viveros Paredes, Jonas Kleyer, Antje Huefner, Sharon Anavi-Goffer, Stefan Raduner, Karl-Heinz Altmann, Jürg Gertsch* (Corresponding Author)

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

62 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

The cannabinoid CB2 receptor is known to modulate osteoclast function by poorly understood mechanisms. Here, we report that the natural biphenyl neolignan 4′-O-methylhonokiol (MH) is a CB2 receptor-selective antiosteoclastogenic lead structure (Ki < 50 nM). Intriguingly, MH triggers a simultaneous Gi inverse agonist response and a strong CB2 receptor-dependent increase in intracellular calcium. The most active inverse agonists from a library of MH derivatives inhibited osteoclastogenesis in RANK ligand-stimulated RAW264.7 cells and primary human macrophages. Moreover, these ligands potently inhibited the osteoclastogenic action of endocannabinoids. Our data show that CB2 receptor-mediated cAMP formation, but not intracellular calcium, is crucially involved in the regulation of osteoclastogenesis, primarily by inhibiting macrophage chemotaxis and TNF-α expression. MH is an easily accessible CB2 receptor-selective scaffold that exhibits a novel type of functional heterogeneity.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1053-1064
Number of pages12
JournalChemistry & Biology
Volume18
Issue number8
Early online date25 Aug 2011
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 26 Aug 2011

Bibliographical note

This work was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) grant 31003A_120672. We thank Bernhard Faller and Jacques Hamon from Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research, Switzerland, for performing the profiling experiment. We thank Maria Feher for isolation of blood-derived monocytes. We express our gratitude to Marketa Bernaskova (FWF grant P21241) for the synthesis of several honokiol derivatives. Thanks are due to Andreas Leitner and Elke Prettner for recording IR and UV spectra of synthesized compounds.

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