Arylfluorosulfate compounds and methods

A high-throughput screening method for identifying anticancer medicinal agents comprising an arylfluorosulfate functional group, the method comprising the sequential steps of:

• (a) distributing solutions comprising about 0.1 μmol of phenolic compounds dissolved in dimethylsulfoxide into wells of a first multi-well plate with one phenolic compound per well, wherein each phenolic compound comprises one or more OH substituent on an aromatic moiety and each solution comprises about 1 μmol of the phenolic compound;
• (b) adding to each well of said first multi-well plate about 10 equivalents of an organic base and about 100 μL of a saturated solution of SO2F2, thereafter sealing each well, thereby initiating reactions between said OH substituents of the phenolic compounds with the SO2F2 and forming candidate arylfluorosulfate anticancer agents therefrom;
• (c) adding an excess of trimethylsilanol to each well in the first multi-well plate after the reaction in step (b) is complete to convert fluoride ion formed from the reaction of the phenolic compound and the SO2F2 into trimethylsilyl fluoride;
• (d) evaporating, in vacuo, dimethylsulfoxide, the organic base, and trimethylsilyl compounds present in the wells to leave a residue of a candidate arylfluorosulfate anticancer agent in each well;
• (e) dissolving each residue in about 10 μL of dimethylsulfoxide to form solutions of the candidate arylfluorosulfate anticancer agents;
• (f) adding at least two concentrations of the candidate arylfluorosulfate anticancer agent solutions from step (e) in the range of about 2×10−7 μM to about 20 μM to cancer cell cultures distributed in wells of a second multi-well plate at cell concentrations of about 3000 to about 5000 cells per well;
• (g) incubating the cell cultures in the second multi-well plate under conditions suitable for viability or growth of the cancer cells;
• and
• (h) assessing the effect of the candidate arylfluorosulfate anticancer medicinal agents on the viability or growth of the cancer cells.