Identification of Nogo-B as a potential therapeutic target of osteosarcoma via stereochemically selective covalent probes

Osteosarcoma (OS) has been defined as one of the most intricate and formidable malignant bone tumors, and there has been no significant improvement in targeted therapies for OS over the past 50 years. Therefore, it is crucial to identify new potential drug targets for OS. Here, we have developed a label-free activity-based protein profiling (ABPP) using a stereochemically selective probe from an in-house patrimonial library of covalent small molecule compounds to identify an anti-OS target. Phenotypic screening resulted in the discovery of a selective inhibitor (S,R)-4v that potently suppresses the proliferation of OS 143B cells with an IC₅₀ value of 0.28 µM. Subsequent label-free ABPP studies identified neurite outgrowth inhibitor B (Nogo-B) as the primary cellular target for (S,R)-4v via a rapid relatively quantitative analysis using its inactive isomer as control. This finding was validated by interaction assays including pull-down, cellular thermal shift assay (CETSA), molecular docking and functional studies. Mechanistic investigations revealed that the apoptotic effect induced by (S,R)-4v was mediated through Nogo-B inhibition of the PI3K/AKT-dependent NF-κB pathway. Altogether, this study presents a novel strategy that couples anti-OS compound screening with target identification and successfully identifies Nogo-B as a potential candidate for targeted OS therapy.